The Lord Jesus Teaches You to Pray

You are able to pray, and you do, because the Lord your God has chosen to communicate with you, and He has thereby established a relationship with you, inviting you to call on Him as your Dad.  It all hinges on the fact that He has called you to be His own, and He has named you His own dear child — in the circumcision made without hands, that is, by your Holy Baptism into Christ Jesus.

As a newborn infant is held safely in the arms of his parents, sheltered in their home, protected by their constant attention, fed and clothed, washed and cared for, so are you held, safe and secure, in your Father’s hand.  Before you have ever learned to know your need or even how to ask for any help (or anything at all), while you are still so oblivious to His providential care, He is already meeting all your needs and preserving the life that He Himself gives to you in body and soul.

But as you are then growing up and learning to live as His child, as a member of the household and family of God, He also teaches you to pray — to say “please” and “thank you,” so to speak.  It’s more than a mere formality or simple politeness; He is catechizing you in the way of faith and love, in the rhythm of family life.  He would have you know and trust, more and more, what He is like, and to become more and more like Him in the way that you think and speak and act, in the way that you live in relation to Him and with others.  He would have His sons grow up to be men after His own heart, and His daughters to become women like His Bride, the Church, the Mother of us all.

So your Father in heaven speaks to you and deals with you in love, and He bestows His Holy Spirit upon you by His grace through the Ministry of the Gospel of His incarnate Son.  For it is in the Word and work of Christ Jesus, the promised Seed of Abraham, in His own Body of flesh and blood, that you know your God and Father and learn to love and trust in Him.

You have heard it already in the case of father Abraham.  When he was a stranger in a pagan land, the Lord God called him, and led him, and brought him to the Land of Promise.  He named him the father of many nations, when that man was already old and still childless.  And the Lord swore an oath to that old man, that He would be with him and bless him, and that all the nations would be saved by and through his Seed.  By the Covenant of Circumcision the Lord God Almighty actually bound Himself to Abraham’s flesh, and sealed His promise in Abraham’s body, eventually to be fulfilled in the Flesh and Blood of Jesus Christ.  By the Spirit of the Lord, Abraham believed the Word and promises of God, and by such faith he was accounted righteous.

All of this the Lord has already accomplished in calling Abraham to Himself, when He then also chooses to reveal to Abraham His plans for Sodom and Gomorrah.  See, He has made Abraham His own beloved child by faith, but here He also invites the man into the intimacy of friendship; more than that, He catechizes Abraham in what it means to be a father.  By Word and example, the Lord prepares the old man to become the patriarch of His people (and the ancestor of His Christ).

To say it simply, the Lord leads Abraham to pray in the righteousness of faith and in the justice of love and mercy.  In laying before him the intentions of His wrath against those wicked cities, He provides Abraham an opportunity to call upon His mercy, and thus to lay hold of Him according to the true heart of His almighty power, which is made known especially in grace and compassion.

Abraham does so with humility and reverence, in the fear of the Lord, to be sure; in repentance he knows himself to be dust and ashes.  Yet, in the faith and knowledge of God’s forgiveness, trusting His Word and promises, and responding to the friendship that God has shown to him, Abraham prays and intercedes for Sodom and Gomorrah with an almost brazen boldness and courageous confidence.  In the righteousness of faith, he appeals to the righteousness of God.  In doing so, he demonstrates a profound understanding, that God will not destroy the righteous with the wicked, but will rather spare the wicked for the sake of the righteous.

Like a little child asking his father for good things, always eager for more in the certainty of Dad’s generosity, Abraham is not shy about asking — and even continuing to push for more.  Except that Abraham does not appeal for himself, nor only for his nephew Lot and his family, but he intercedes for the entire population of those evil cities.  It’s not that he condones or defends their wickedness — he does not — but he pleads that God would be patient, and preserve the righteous remnant, and spare the rest of the people on account of the few righteous among them.

This is not simply how Abraham happens to pray, but this is how he believes in God, how he exercises his faith in the promises of God, and how he lives in the confidence and expectation of God’s faithfulness and grace.  And with such prayer he will likewise teach his children to know and love the Lord their God, to worship Him in repentant faith, and to live in the sure and certain hope of His mercy and forgiveness.  It is specifically for the sake of such catechesis of his children and descendants that God here catechizes Abraham by opening Himself up to the man.

This is what fathers do for their children.  They teach them how to pray, and thereby teach them to know God rightly, to love and trust in Him, and to live in love for other people, too.  Along with all the other things a father teaches and does for his children, nothing else is more fundamental and important than prayer.  A father prays for his children and sets an example of prayer for them.  He prays also for himself, because he lives by faith in his own God and Father.  And he intercedes for others beyond the family, because he exercises love for the neighbor.  Children learn from all of this, even as they learn to ask for and receive good things from their Dad.

So Abraham did for his family, for his descendants.  And humanly speaking, you might consider, then, where and how the Lord Jesus first learned to pray, and how to pray, when He was a little Boy.  Surely His parents taught Him with their words and by their example.  Joseph and Mary of Nazareth, being faithful in their callings, as they had learned from their own fathers and mothers, catechized and taught their Son from the Holy Scriptures.  So did Jesus learn to pray from the Word of God in their home, in the synagogue, and at the Temple in Jerusalem.

Now, then, in much the same way, the Lord Jesus teaches His own household and family to pray.  As the incarnate Son of God, a Man after His Father’s heart, He is a faithful Husband and Father to His Church.  And that means that, not only does He protect and provide for His people, but He also teaches them to live by faith, to live in love, to call upon Him, and to call upon the Father in His Name, to pray and petition, to praise and give thanks.  So does He catechize you even now.

He urges you to pray with all boldness and confidence.  That is the chief and central point to His two little Parables this morning.  You should not be shy or hesitant in going to the Lord in every circumstance, whatever the time of day or night.  You can count on Him to provide for your every need, so that you will lack for no good thing, neither for yourself nor for your neighbors.  And you may ask Him with the confidence of a child seeking help from his or her Dad, except that He is not a sinful man but the gracious and merciful Lord, who is merciful to all who call upon Him.

Jesus not only urges you to pray — as elsewhere the Lord commands you to pray — but He also provides you with the very words by which to call upon the Father in His Name; and He promises that His Father will hear and answer your prayer.  He will not ignore you.  He will not deny your prayer or refuse to meet your needs.  Neither will He give you evil things instead of good, but He will pour out His Life-giving Holy Spirit upon you, so that you do not perish but gain eternal Life.

The Our Father is more than information or instruction.  With these Words the Lord God does for you as He did for Abraham.  He initiates and establishes a relationship with you, an intimacy of friendship and familial love.  He draws you into a fellowship of faith with Himself, and thereby also makes a place for you within the broad fellowship and family of His one, holy, catholic, and Apostolic Church.  He teaches you to pray, not in lonely isolation, nor as a private individual, but within a community of brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus, with one God and Father in heaven.

To pray in this way is to be and to live as a Christian, as a child of God, a disciple of Jesus.  It is to actively rely upon the Lord your God for all that you need, for both your body and your soul, for this life and for the Life everlasting.  It is to live by faith in His forgiveness, and therefore, also, to forgive those who sin against you.  It is to eat from the open hand of God, and to open your hand in love to feed and care for your neighbor, for your own children and family, and for your fellow Christians, and even for the fellow who comes calling on you for help in the middle of the night.

As you pray, so do you believe, and so do you live.  Or, so you should.

Where do the confidence and courage come from?  Where are such faith and love to be found?  How shall you pray as you ought, and how shall you live and love in harmony with such prayer?

The answer is found — and it is given to you — in the very One who teaches you to pray.  Your boldness and confidence rest upon His generous love and gracious mercy toward you.  Your faith resides in His faithfulness.  As a child of God in Christ Jesus, you learn to rely upon your Father by way of His constant care for you, and from His compassion for you in all trial, fear, and need.

Jesus teaches all of this in teaching you to pray.  But that is not all that He does.  For one thing, He exemplifies the life of prayer in His own practice.  Especially in St. Luke’s Holy Gospel, the Lord Jesus is often found praying; for He lives in perfect faith and perfect love, and so He persists in perfect prayer.  That belongs, first of all, to His life as the true and perfect Man.  But then it also belongs to His Office and Ministry as your merciful and great High Priest.  It is still the case that He actively prays and intercedes for you, now and forever, at the Right Hand of the Father.

The Lord Jesus Christ, by His Cross and Passion, and in His Resurrection and Ascension, is not only the One who prays for you, but He Himself is your Voice of Prayer to the God and Father in heaven.  As He is the Word of God to you, made Flesh and dwelling with you bodily in the Gospel, so is He also the divine Word that avails for you and speaks to the Father on your behalf.  And He is also already the Father’s resounding “Yes” and “Amen” to all of your prayers and all of your needs.  It is in Him, by His Ministry of the Gospel, that the Father gives to you the Holy Spirit.

For the sake of this one Righteous Man, Christ Jesus, the Lord God Almighty forgives you all your sins.  He does not punish or destroy you, nor count your transgressions against you, nor withhold any good thing from you because of your sins.  On the contrary, He rescues you from every evil of body and soul, saves you from sin and death, and reconciles you to Himself in Christ Jesus.

Along with His forgiveness of your sins He also feeds you with the Bread that you need.  Bread for each day, yes, to nourish and support this body and life on earth.  But also the Bread of eternal Life, the Bread which does not perish but preserves you in the imperishable Body of Jesus.  Hence the connections that Christians have always made between our prayer for “Daily Bread” and the forgiveness of sins and the fellowship of the Lord’s Altar in the Body and Blood of Christ Jesus.

It is in the eating and drinking of these Holy Things — in this Bread and this Cup, which are given and poured out for you and for the many — that you are firmly bound to Christ, your Head, and that all of you are knit together as one Body in Him.  Forgiven and forgiving, you eat and drink together with the Lord, and so also with each other in Him, unto faith and life forever.

Beloved in the Lord, as He so teaches you to live by faith in Him and in fervent love for family, friends, and neighbors, so, then, pray for one another.  Pray that God’s Kingdom would come to all of us and all the world.  And pray that He would take not His Holy Spirit from His Church on earth, but would continue to pour out the Spirit generously upon us through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The One who teaches you to pray is faithful, and He will do it.  Not because of your resolve or perseverance, but for the sake of His own righteousness.  For Christ has come, and He remains with you in peace and love.  He has taken His stand with you, and as He has died for you and risen from the dead, He ever lives to make intercession for you.  His prayer for you is signed and sealed with His holy and precious Blood, by His Cross and Passion, and in His Holy Communion.  And His own Resurrection and Ascension are indeed the answer that your dear Father gives to you.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Timely and Apropos for a Day of Humiliation and Prayer

O Eternal and Merciful God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, we acknowledge and confess before Thee our manifold and great offenses. We have experienced Thy goodness, but have not been led to repentance. We have seen thy judgments abroad in the earth, but have not learned righteousness. Above all, we have neglected the means of grace and set at naught Thy tender mercies in Christ Jesus. But Thou art a merciful God, full of compassion, long-suffering, and of great pity, who hast no pleasure in the death of sinners, but hadst rather that they turn from their sins and be saved. Be gracious unto us, therefore, even as Thou art wont. Spare us, O Lord, though for our evil deeds we do worthily deserve to be punished. In the midst of judgment still remember mercy. For Thy dear Son's sake, forgive us all our past sins, and grant that we may hereafter serve and please Thee in newness of life, to the honor and glory of Thy name.

Be Thou our Refuge and Strength, a very present Help in trouble.

Protect Thy Church, the vineyard which Thou hast planted among us, and water it abundantly with the rivers of living water. Give grace to all the ministers of Thy Gospel, that they may both by their doctrine and life set forth Thy true and lively Word, and grant that Thy little flock may dwell in peace and safety everywhere.

Preserve us from plague and pestilence, from war and bloodshed, from fire and flood, from failure of harvest and from famine, from lightning and tempest, and from all other calamities.

We entreat Thee also for all those who are in authority over us; counsel them by Thy wisdom, and strengthen their hands, that they may so wait on their office as to promote Thy glory and the common good. And grant grace to all Thy people, that we may submit ourselves to every ordinance of man for Thy sake, and be subject to the higher powers, reverencing  them and upholding them in all their lawful endeavors to maintain justice and righteousness among men.

Teach us to live, day by day, in humble dependence on Thy promises, in cheerful obedience to Thy laws, and in a sure and certain hope of a blessed immortality.

Fill our hearts with a due sense of Thy unspeakable love in the redemption of our souls, that we may with filial confidence call upon Thee in the day of trouble and, among all the changes of this mortal life, ever be defended by Thy most gracious and ready help.

Have mercy upon us, O Lord, in our every need. Save Thy people and bless Thine inheritance, that Thy glory may dwell in our land.

Almighty God, who hast given us grace at this time with one accord to make our common supplications unto Thee, and dost promise, where two or three are gathered together in Thy name, Thou wilt grant their requests, fulfill now, O Lord, the desires and petitions of Thy servants as may be most expedient for us, granting us in this world knowledge of Thy truth and in the world to come life everlasting; for the sake of the redemption and intercession of Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, who, with Thee and the Holy Ghost, liveth and reigneth in equal majesty and glory, true God and man, blessed forever. Amen. (The Lutheran Liturgy, 366-368).

For the Prayers of the Church

O God, by whom all fatherhood in heaven and on earth is named, we give You thanks and praise for our fathers on earth, and for the good gifts of daily bread that You provide Your children through them.  Grant to all men the grace to serve with a compassion after Your own heart, caring for their own families, for Your Church, and for widows and orphans in distress; that they would use the strength and skill You have given them, to defend, protect, and support the weak and the small and all of their neighbors; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

For the Prayers of the Church

Lord God, heavenly Father, we praise You and give thanks for Your gifts and blessings of marriage and family, and for giving and sustaining life through our mothers.  Support them in their callings, and strengthen them in all adversity, that they might glorify Your Holy Name; and grant that we might rightly honor our mothers according to Your Word.  Draw near to those who long for children, and hear their prayers; comfort those who mourn the loss of their children; and pour out Your gracious providence upon all widows and orphans in their loneliness and distress; through Jesus Christ, our Lord.  Amen.

On Prayer

There is nothing more basic to the Christian faith and life than prayer. For prayer is the very voice of faith itself and the primary good work of the Christian life, an act of love for both God and the neighbor. It is of first importance, St. Paul writes, that “prayer, intercession, supplication and thanksgiving be made on behalf of all men” (1 Tim 2:1), in the name and for the sake of Jesus Christ, who died for all and desires that all men be saved. Christians are therefore to pray at all times, “without ceasing,” and not to lose heart (1 Thess 5:17; St. Luke 18:1).

How, then, shall we pray? The Lord Himself must teach us, by His Word and with His Holy Spirit, because we do not know how to pray as we should (St. Luke 11:1-4; Rom 8:14-27). Not only has He commanded us to pray and promised to hear us, but He has given us the Words with which to pray in His Name (St. John 15:16; 16:26-27; St. Matt 6:6-13; 18:19-20). He not only teaches but exemplifies the life of prayer: from the waters of the Jordan (St. Luke 3:21) to the Garden of Gethsemane (St. Luke 22:39-46); from His Transfiguration (St. Luke 9:29) to His Crucifixion (St. Luke 23:33-34, 46; Heb 5:7). What is more, having sacrificed Himself for us upon the Cross, as our great High Priest, He has also risen from the dead and ascended to the right hand of the Father, where He ever lives to make intercession for us (Heb 7:25).

This is our sure and certain confidence in prayer, that Christ and His Spirit pray with us and for us (St. John 17; Heb 7:25; Rom 8:14-27). We pray to “our Father in heaven,” as those who are baptized into Christ Jesus, the beloved and well-pleasing Son (St. Luke 3:21-22). His God and Father is our God and Father (St. John 20:17; Gal 4:4-7), and His prayer is our prayer. It is for this reason that we “ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach,” and that we do so “in faith without any doubting” (James 1:5-6).

That voice of faith which approaches the throne of grace with all boldness and confidence (Heb 10:19-23), like that of little children asking of their dear Father, arises in our hearts and from our mouths by the hearing of the Word of Christ (Rom 10:17). Christian prayer necessarily begins, therefore, not with our speaking, but with that hearing of Christ Jesus, our Savior. For He is merciful to all who call upon Him in truth, but how shall we call upon Him whom we have not heard (Rom 10:11-14)?

Prayer goes hand-in-hand with the Word of God, and we cannot pray without it. The prayer of the Church belongs inseparably to the teaching and fellowship of the Apostles, who devoted themselves to prayer and the Ministry of the Word (Acts 2:42; 6:4). So it is that all things are sanctified to our use by the Word of God and prayer (1 Tim 4:4-5). We do not have the one without the other. It is the Word of the Lord that opens our lips to pray, praise and give thanks (Ps 51:15). Before it is ever a petition or request, prayer is first of all the confession of what God has spoken; and already in asking for what He has promised, we give thanks, for we know that His answer in Christ Jesus is always “Yes, and Amen” (2 Cor 1:20).

Every good and perfect gift is from the Lord, our God and Father in Christ Jesus, including all that we need for both body and soul, for this life and the life everlasting. All that He has created and given to us is to be “received with thanksgiving,” and again, “sanctified by means of the Word of God and prayer” (1 Tim 4:4-5). In this way His Name is kept holy among us, the very first thing for which He has taught us to pray. So, too, we sanctify each day as a Sabbath rest in Christ; not simply Saturday or Sunday, but all our days and nights, evening and morning. His Name is holy in itself, and every day is holy to the Lord, but these sacred things are made holy for us by the speaking and hearing of His Word in faith.

The rhythm of daily prayer is really a daily catechesis in the Word of God. As we hear and confess His Word, as we are instructed in the way of faith and love by the Law and the Gospel, and as we are thus taught to pray, His Holy Spirit is actively present and at work to bring us daily to repentance. He calls us by the Gospel, enlightens us with His gifts, sanctifies us in the faith, and keeps us united with Christ our Lord. All of this the Spirit does by the Word, which puts the old Adam in us to death and raises us to newness of life with our crucified and risen Lord Jesus. That is the rhythm of life for every baptized believer in Christ, but it never is by our own reason and strength. In the weakness of our faith we simply cry out, “Lord, have mercy and help us!” We avail ourselves of His Word and Spirit, and we pray. We rely upon the Ministry of His Gospel in His Church, and no less so do we give attention to His Word and prayer all week long. Indeed, the stronger and more mature a Christian is, the more he or she will gladly hear and learn the Word of God; and, in doing so, the more frequently and fervently he or she will pray.

There is no time of the day or night when a Christian does not cry out from the heart unto the Lord in repentant faith. Faith itself is already the inward groaning of the Holy Spirit within us for Christ our Lord (Rom 8:26-27). But as we believe with the heart, so do we confess with the mouth that Jesus is our Lord and God (Rom 10:8-10). As we have heard, so do we believe, and so do we speak in confession and prayer (2 Cor 4:13).

To call upon the Name of the Lord is the Christian’s daily sacrifice of thanksgiving, in the morning and at the close of day (Ps 88:1-2, 13; 116:17; 119:147-148; 139:11-12; 141:1-2). With such prayer, whereby we look unto the Lord for all that we need, we worship and adore Him as our true and only God. Not only that, but in our love for Him we also pray and intercede for His entire Church and for the whole world, which He so loves, and for which He has given His only-begotten Son, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, in whose dear Name we pray. In our prayer and intercession for the world — for our neighbors near and far, known and unknown, both friend and foe — we are united to Christ our Head, our great High Priest, as a royal priesthood of the baptized. Praying for our neighbor in this way, as Christ Jesus prays for us and for all, is the most distinctive and definitive duty of our priestly vocation as Christians.

As often as we pray the Our Father, and as often as we pray at all in the Name of Jesus, we are praying for His entire Church in heaven and on earth, and for as many as He will call to Himself to be His own dear children from all the nations (Acts 2:39). In that same light, it is comforting to realize that His entire Church is always praying day and night for each and all of us, from the rising of the sun to the place where it sets (Malachi 1:11; Ps 113:2-3). So do we Christians have all things in common, and with our prayers we love and serve one another (Acts 2:42-47).

As fundamental as all of this is to the Christian faith and life — as significant and necessary as the Word of God and prayer are to our spiritual health and strength — the actual practice of daily prayer does not come so easily or naturally to any of us poor sinners. How often have we tried, perhaps, to establish some routine, some discipline of prayer and devotion, whether on our own or with our families, only to find that it becomes harder and harder to keep up with it? We are so easily distracted by “the worries of the world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the desire for other things” (St. Mark 4:19), and we so readily give away our time, attentions and energies to “every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us” (Heb 12:1). It seems burdensome to devote ourselves, our hearts and minds, our bodies and souls, to the Word of the Lord. Yet, His Word alone endures forever, while all of those temporal things that we chase after will wither and fade like the grass and the flower of the field (1 Pet 1:24-25). The more we are enticed by the idols of this world, the more desperately we need the Word of the one true God in Christ!

Thankfully, He does not leave us tossed about and helpless, but in His compassion shepherds us. By His grace and tender mercy, He encourages us and assists us in the discipline of daily prayer, first of all by His commands and promises. “For He Himself has commanded us to pray and has promised to hear us” (Small Catechism). Again, along with His exhortation and admonition, He has also given us the very Words with which we are to pray: “Our Father, who art in heaven.” He has taught us how to pray, not only by His Holy Scriptures, but even before we could read He put His prayer upon our lips, and thereby into our hearts and minds, by the teaching and example of our parents and pastors. The Second and Third Commandments, too, not only expose our sin, but serve as a curb and a guide, as a rule of faith and prayer. The Second Table of the Law helps to protect our neighbor from the harm that we would do him, but the First Table of the Law is for our own protection, that we should not neglect to hear the Word of God and call upon His Name. Our earthly parents require us to eat our vegetables, even before we have learned to enjoy them. So does our Father in heaven command us to listen and to pray, even when we would rather not. Then, by His living and active Word, He brings our hearts and minds along in repentance.

The Lord Jesus continues teaching us to pray, and His Holy Spirit daily continues to help us in our weakness. He does so by the ways and the means of His Word, by the agency of His Church on earth and the Ministry of His Gospel. As we thus hear and receive His gracious Word, in which He and His Spirit are actively present and at work to give us faith and life, so does He gather us up in Himself and bring us, like sweet incense (Ps 141:1–2), into the Holy of Holies made without hands, eternal in the heavens (Heb 9:11; 2 Cor 5:1), to be well received by Our Father. Amen.