I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; for kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.
1 Timothy 2:1-4 KJV
‘This, then, is how you should pray: ‘ “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. ”
Matthew 6:9-13 NIVUK
Prayer is also rooted in WHERE WE ARE.
Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.’
Jeremiah 29:7 NIVUK
There is something dramatic about the way Jesus tells us we should pray that we often miss. This might seem quite grammatical at the beginning, but bear with me.
A minority in our culture are obsessed with pronouns. But look at the pronouns used in this prayer. Surprisingly, there are only two: 'you' and 'our'. No 'I'.
Yet Jesus left us instructions that we should pray alone, as we saw earlier (Matthew 6:6). So how can we pray about 'our', when there's only 'I'?
I don't believe that Jesus is using what we call in the UK the 'royal we', where we use collective pronoun to refer to ourselves as individuals.
No, this was spoken in first century Greek and they didn't do anything like that. This is something way more profound.
Jesus is asking us to pray with other people, and for other people. The 'our' here means that we stand shoulder-to-shoulder with other Christians, some of whom we will never know or meet, to pray for common items of concern (Acts 1:14; Ephesians 6:18). It also means that we represent those around us - our families and flatmates, our colleagues, our neighbourhood, our authorities, our town, our county, our country, our world - before God. When we pray the 'our' in this prayer, we are identifying with and praying for them.
And what are we praying for them?
For food - that God would give us our daily bread
For forgiveness - that God would forgive our sins
For freedom from temptations and trials
What an awesome prayer!
This is a communal prayer prayed alone. It is a prayer prayed in isolation for other people and with other people.
So how do we work this out practically? How do we pray for and with other people?
Firstly, praying for other people. I am a proponent of the ripple methodology, where you start with yourself (you should have been praying for yourself during your quiet time as you read and study the Scriptures) and work your way out, in line with how Jesus asked the disciples to be His witnesses in Acts 1:8. For example:
1. I pray for myself and bring my day before the Lord
2. I then pray for the people I interact with most often - the people I live with
3. I then pray for my extended family
4. I then pray for my neighbours and colleagues
5. I then pray for my church and its leaders
6. I then pray for my town and council leaders
7. I then pray for my country and its leaders
8. I then pray for missionaries I know
9. I then pray for missionaries I don't know, countries, organisations, the unreached and the world as a whole
We can also pray with others by using shared prayer points from our church, prayer chain or mission organisations.
Prayer should be done in the quiet place, alone and behind a closed door. We should be on our own. But we should not ever be truly alone. We have the immense privilege of representing others before God - which is what intercessory prayer truly is. We pray for others and with others.
Uniting with others in prayer, even if alone, can be a most wonderful place of deep fellowship. Identifying with others and sharing their joy when prayers are answered is truly a blessing.
Maybe it's time we started to see the 'our' in prayer and sought the peace and prosperity of the place where God has placed us.
Comments