Phil Rowlands

Hello, my friends!

Today, I'd like to chat with you about prayer – a topic that I believe is crucial for our walk with God. You know, prayer isn't just about reciting words or following a formula. It's about connecting with our Heavenly Father, aligning our hearts with His, and participating in His work on earth. It's a beautiful, intimate conversation that can transform our lives and the world around us.

Jesus, in His wisdom, gave us a beautiful model for prayer in Matthew 6. But let's be clear – He wasn't handing us a script to repeat mindlessly. Rather, He was showing us the heart of prayer, the priorities that should shape our conversations with God. It's not about impressing others with our eloquence or length of prayers. In fact, Jesus warned against that very thing! He said, “And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words” (Matthew 6:7).

Friends, prayer is fundamentally about relationship. When we pray, we're not approaching a distant, impersonal deity. We're coming to our Father. Isn't that amazing? The Creator of the universe, the Almighty God, invites us to call Him “Father”! This understanding should transform how we pray. We're not grovelling before a harsh judge or trying to persuade an unwilling benefactor. We're speaking to a loving Father who knows our needs even before we ask.

But here's the thing – while God is our Father, He's also holy. “Hallowed be Your name,” Jesus taught us to pray. We come with reverence, recognising God's absolute perfection and majesty. It's a delicate balance, isn't it? Intimacy and awe, familiarity and reverence. But that's the beauty of our relationship with God – He's both our loving Father and the Holy One of Israel. As the psalmist wrote, “For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward those who fear Him” (Psalm 103:11).

Now, let's talk about God's kingdom. “Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Friends, when we pray this, we're aligning ourselves with God's purposes in the world. We're saying, “God, let Your rule and reign be established here, starting with me.” It's a prayer for the spread of the gospel, for lives to be transformed, for the values of heaven to be manifest on earth.

Remember what Paul wrote in Colossians 1:13? “He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love.” When we pray for God's kingdom to come, we're essentially praying for what happened to us to happen to others – for people to be rescued from darkness and brought into God's marvellous light. It's a prayer that echoes God's heart, for as Peter reminds us, “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).

Friends, this prayer for God's kingdom isn't just words. It should shape our priorities, our actions. Are we involved in sharing the good news? Are we living in a way that reflects God's rule in our lives? Are we making disciples, teaching others to follow Jesus? These are the practical outworkings of praying for God's kingdom to come. As James reminds us, “But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves” (James 1:22).

Now, let's consider the phrase, “Your will be done.” This is where the rubber meets the road in our spiritual lives. It's easy to say these words, but living them out? That's another story. We often come to God with our plans, our ideas of how things should work out. But true prayer involves surrendering our will to His. It's about trusting that His ways are higher than our ways, His thoughts higher than our thoughts (Isaiah 55:9).

Remember Jesus in Gethsemane? “Not My will, but Yours be done.” That's the heart of prayer right there. It's not about bending God's will to ours, but aligning our will with His. And you know what? When we do that, we find peace. We find purpose. We find that God's plans are always better than ours. As Jeremiah 29:11 reminds us, “'For I know the thoughts that I think toward you,' says the Lord, 'thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.'”

Paul prayed for the Colossians to be “filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding” (Colossians 1:9). That's a prayer we can echo for ourselves and others. Because knowing God's will isn't about having all the answers or seeing the future. It's about knowing God's character, understanding His heart, and trusting His guidance day by day.

Friends, when we pray “Your will be done,” we're not resigning ourselves to fate. We're actively choosing to trust God's wisdom over our own limited understanding. We're saying, “God, I trust that Your way is best, even when I don't understand it.” It's a prayer that echoes the sentiment of Proverbs 3:5-6: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.”

Now, let's talk about our daily needs. “Give us this day our daily bread.” This simple request reminds us of our dependence on God. In a world that prizes self-sufficiency, it's humbling to acknowledge that everything we have comes from God. As James 1:17 reminds us, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights.”

But why pray for our needs if God already knows them? Well, prayer isn't for God's benefit – it's for ours. It keeps us in that place of Christ-dependency, reminding us daily that we need God. It guards against the pride that can creep in when we start thinking we've got everything under control. Jesus Himself said, “Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things” (Matthew 6:31-32).

Now we come to a challenging part of the prayer: “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” Friends, this isn't about earning God's forgiveness by forgiving others. Our sins – past, present, and future – were forgiven at the cross. As Colossians 2:13-14 beautifully puts it, “And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.”

But Jesus is emphasising something crucial here: the importance of extending to others the same grace we've received. You see, while our vertical relationship with God has been fully restored through Christ, our horizontal relationships with others can still be a struggle. Jesus gave us one primary commandment: to love others as He has loved us. And part of that love is forgiveness.

Friends, unforgiveness is a prison. It binds us to the past and hinders our spiritual growth. Joseph forgave his brothers who sold him into slavery. David respected Saul even when Saul was trying to kill him. These men moved forward in their calling because they didn't let bitterness take root in their hearts. As Hebrews 12:15 warns us, we must be “looking carefully lest anyone fall short of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up cause trouble, and by this many become defiled.”

Remember, forgiving doesn't mean approving of wrong actions. It doesn't mean pretending everything is okay when it's not. But it does mean releasing the debt, choosing not to hold the offense against the person. It's a decision, often one we have to make repeatedly, to extend grace as we've been given grace. As Paul exhorts us in Ephesians 4:32, “And be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.”

Finally, we come to the last part of the prayer: “And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.” This reminds us that we have an enemy, friends. The devil is real, and he seeks to draw us away from God. But here's the good news: greater is He that is in us than he that is in the world (1 John 4:4).

When we pray this part of the prayer, we're acknowledging our need for God's protection and guidance. We're recognising that in our own strength, we're no match for the enemy's schemes. But with God's help, we can stand firm. As James 4:7 instructs us, “Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.”

Be blessed today my brothers and sisters, let's remember that prayer is not just a religious duty. It's a lifeline, a direct connection to our loving Father. It's where we align our hearts with His, where we find strength for each day, where we participate in His work in the world. May our prayer lives be rich, genuine, and transformative. May we approach God with both the intimacy of a child and the reverence due His holy name. And may our prayers shape not just our words, but our lives, making us more like Jesus each day. As Paul encourages us in 1 Thessalonians 5:17-18, “pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”

Phil