Day 9: Hallowed be Your Name
After 9 days in this prayer, and 12 more to go, I feel like I need to signal time out for a second. Because as humans we have a tendency to forget. And not just car keys, important dates and children in the car when we go into the grocery store (in our defence, we only did it once very, very briefly...and she's a resilient fourth child so she was fine.)
Where was I?
Right. A time out. I need to remind myself every once in a while that this endeavour to study and pray the Lord's Prayer is not about introducing another checklist or magic formula to help our prayer life get off the ground. I said it in the introduction to this study, but it's worth repeating that The Lord's Prayer is not so much about teaching us what to pray, as it is about teaching us to whom we pray. My heart is that we see the posture and purpose each line carries and let that understanding guide us-people who forget, who are easily distracted-into a bigger vision of the God who joins us through this practice.
After all, it's much easier to talk someone you actually know right?
Second(I think I only have three points so hang in there...), as I sat in quarantine this past March, faced with the shallowness of my prayer life and a desperate desire to see some renewal come about in my life and faith, one big question loomed. How do I change? I posed the question to the Lord and He gently turned my attention to one word.
Repetition.
Think about it. Multiplication tables, artistic skills, musical repertoire, reps at the gym, training drills...I have so many examples of this from my own life. Consider how you teach a toddler to speak or sleep...or even eat! We create routines for ourselves and our children in hopes they would learn something or a behaviour pattern will change. We could go on, but it's a fundamental truth of human development that we change through repetition. By practice.
It was Jesus' key complaint against the Pharisees: "they preach but they do not practice."* Reading that verse this spring poked at something and I knew I needed to respond. In order to grow in prayer, I need to practice it. I need to pray every day. And while I don't want to turn The Lord's Prayer into some duty that becomes rote and lifeless, I'm keenly aware of the way our culture goes after the quick fix rather than slow, patient and gritty growth. So the point is to practice the posture and purpose...as we do this God will work in us and I think the words of the prayer will slowly become our own!
Finally, let's talk briefly about one more barrier to prayer that many of us share in common. Truth is, when we feel like we have legitimately persisted in prayer over a matter, and are still not hearing or seeing an answer...it can begin to feel a bit pointless. Discouragement overcomes desire and prayer dwindles.
May I just suggest to you that this might come from another misunderstanding of prayer? We've been conditioned to think that prayer is a way to acquire something(health, wealth, accomplishment, possessions...), and that if we just pray the right words in the right way...surely God who we believe to be good and loving will give us these things. Our prayer life becomes driven by results rather than relationship. And when the results don't come? Well...the whole discipline can fall apart. However instead of viewing prayer as a way to acquire some specific thing, I have found it radically formational to see prayer as a way to acquire Jesus Himself.
But now I'm getting ahead of myself. I'll see you tomorrow where we'll start reflecting on the line "your Kingdom come."
Today we'll read 1 Samuel 2:1-10. This is the prayer of Hannah, a woman who understood what is was like to live with years of unanswered prayer. But studying her full story reveals more than just the happy ending of long awaited results. Hannah was a woman who was more interested in God working out His covenant plan in her and her nation, than simply improving her circumstances. I think it's because Hannah saw God Himself as the most holy thing.
Read Hannah's prayer and look for all the ways she "hallows" the name of the LORD. Let what you see in the scripture form your continued understanding of God's beautiful holiness, and talk to Him about the truth that stands out to you.
Today, as you pray the line, "hallowed be your name," of The Lord's Prayer, I offer you these heartfelt words of Henri Nouwen. May they become your heart's cry as well:
Dear Lord, help me keep my eyes on you. You are the incarnation of divine love, you are the expression of God's infinite compassion, you are the visible manifestation of the Father's holiness. You are beauty, goodness, gentleness, forgiveness, and mercy. In you all can be found. Outside of you nothing can be found. Why should I look elsewhere or go elsewhere? You have the words of eternal life, you are food and drink, you are the Way, the Truth and the Life. You are the light that shines in the darkness, the lamp on the lamp stand, the house on the hilltop. You are the perfect icon of God. In and through you I can see and find my way to the Heavenly Father. O Holy One, Beautiful One, Glorious One, be my Lord, my Saviour, my Redeemer, my Guide, my Consoler, my Comforter, my Hope, my Joy, and my Peace. To you I want to give all that I am. Let me be generous, not stingy or hesitant. Let me give you all-all I have, think, do and feel. It is yours, O Lord. Please accept it and make if fully your own.
Amen.
Grace and peace friends!
*Matthew 23:3
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