Pray With Purpose

Do we pray with purpose? That is an essential question for us to consider. Imagine you and your best friend are having a conversation, but instead of discussing what’s going on in your lives, or the world, or even reminiscing about old times, you utter a string of words. What kind of conversation would that be? What type of sharing of the heart would take place? Yet many do this in prayer. Jesus tells us that we need to pray with a purpose.

Pray With Purpose

Gospel - Matthew 6:7-15

Jesus said to his disciples:

"In praying, do not babble like the pagans,

who think that they will be heard because of their many words.

Do not be like them.

Your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

"This is how you are to pray:

'Our Father who art in heaven,

hallowed be thy name,

thy Kingdom come,

thy will be done,

on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread;

and forgive us our trespasses,

as we forgive those who trespass against us;

and lead us not into temptation,

but deliver us from evil.'

"If you forgive others their transgressions,

your heavenly Father will forgive you.

But if you do not forgive others,

neither will your Father forgive your transgressions."

Scriptural Analysis

Jesus opens this section by instructing his disciples to be disciplined in prayer and not babble like the pagans. There are several key points to consider here. First, Jesus is not telling the disciples not to be persistent in prayer or even to avoid repetition in prayer, which is Biblically based and pleases God (see Daniel 3:52-68 for an example of such repetition). Instead, he is condemning what was a common pagan practice where they would recite the divine names and formulas, imploring the Gods to act on their behalf. The pagans try to grab the attention of God. Jesus reminds them that the Heavenly Father already knows what they need before they even ask him. They need to trust that he will provide for them.

Jesus then offers a model of prayer that has come to be known as the Lord’s Prayer, also referred to as the Our Father. This prayer is the pivotal center point of his Sermon on the Mount. The prayer is structured as a series of seven petitions: three that focus on God and then four that focus on ourselves.

These first three petitions draw us closer to God, focusing on Him alone. Nowhere in these petitions do we mention ourselves. This shows us that the first focus of prayer must be to praise and glorify the one we love: to think of him first.

The first petition, “hallowed be thy name,” is not a petition for God’s name to be holy, for God’s name is already holy. Instead, it is a petition that the world may recognize God’s name as holy. The Prophet Ezekiel speaks of God’s name being made known among the nations. (Ezekiel 36:22-27) The second petition recalls the words of the Prophet that foretell of God coming to establish his reign over all the nations, "The Lord has bared his holy arm before the eyes of all the nations.” (Isaiah 52:10) This second petition is asking for these prophecies to be fulfilled.

The third petition that Jesus presents concerns the will of God. Of course, God’s will is perfectly done in heaven. We ask that his will also be done on earth. We are asking that everyone on earth join the angels and saints in heaven and serve the King.

Jesus now shifts to the four petitions that concern us. These four can be remembered as give us, forgive us, do not subject us, and deliver us. It opens with ‘Give us this day our daily bread.’ Immediately, this should bring to mind the manna in the desert, “Morning by morning they gathered it, each as much as he could eat; but when the sun grew hot, it melted.” (Exodus 16:21) God provided them with enough bread for the day, but only that day (except the Sabbath). In this prayer, we acknowledge our complete dependence upon God. In this prayer, bread refers to our physical food, but it can also refer to the bread of the future: the new Exodus when the manna would return. Of course, most Church Fathers interpret this to be a foreshadowing of the Eucharist, the bread of life.

Trespasses (sometimes rendered debt) is a metaphor for sin. We ask that our sins be forgiven, while at the same time forgiving those who have sinned against us. This reminds us that the measure of God’s forgiveness we receive is equivalent to the measure of forgiveness that we extend to others. The Catechism of the Catholic Church drives home this point: “This outpouring of mercy cannot penetrate our hearts as long as we have not forgiven those who have trespassed against us. Love, like the Body of Christ, is indivisible; we cannot love the God we cannot see if we do not love the brother or sister we do see.” (CCC 2840)

In the sixth petition, we ask for protection from committing sins in the future, “and lead us not into temptation.” This can also be rendered Do not subject us to the final test. Now, testing is not necessarily a bad thing. God tested the people in the desert during the Exodus, and Jesus was led into the wilderness to be tempted. What this petition acknowledges is that we are weak and can’t handle the trials without God’s assistance. Pope Benedict XVI comments that in this petition, we ask God not to test us beyond our capacity. It’s as if we’re saying, "I know I need trials... When you decide to send me these trials ...please remember that my strength goes only so far. Don't overestimate my capacity... and be close to me with your protecting hand when it becomes too much for me."

In the final petition, we ask God to deliver us from the devil, the evil one who opposes Him. We pray to be protected from all evil he instigates, not just from evil in general. This is a prayer to be delivered from Satan and all his evil works.

Daily Application

The ‘Our Father’ is perhaps the most famous prayer ever said. Christians of all denominations are familiar with and recite this prayer. Bing Crosby recorded himself singing the prayer. Even non-Christians have heard the prayer before. The Lord’s Prayer is a prayer with a purpose. There are no excessive words or useless repetition. Instead, it gets to the point and does so in the correct way. It begins by praising God for who He is and what He has done, and only after that does it petition God for our needs.

By giving us this prayer, Jesus gave us a model for what prayer should look like. Ultimately, prayer is a conversation between us and God. A conversation should have a flow and purpose. There should be an exchange and not just mindless babbling. This is seen in the Our Father. We praise God and then we share with him what is on our heart: in this case, the most important of needs, physical and spiritual sustenance. God is treated as our lovely Father to whom we are grateful and bring forth our needs in honesty and sincerity. He is not being treated as a magic genie who does our bidding.

We would do well to examine our prayer lives. How do we approach prayer? Do we treat God as a magic genie, bringing him a list of needs and nothing more? Do we recite the Rosary mindlessly with no thought at all to the words coming forth from our mouths? Our prayers should resemble the Our Father. Not that the Our Father is the only prayer we need to say, but that our prayer should resemble that.

Come before God and acknowledge his greatness and the blessings that he has given you. This alone will do wonders for your soul and your mental health. Even when you feel like the entire world is caving in on you and nothing is going right, forcing yourself to consider how God has blessed you will amaze you to see what He has done and how He is working in your life.

Then, share what is on your heart. We often fail to do this because we say that God already knows our hearts, so why do we need to share them with Him? That is not the correct way to look at things. Just as a parent, who often knows what is going on with their child before they talk to their parent, wants their children to share what is happening in their lives, so too does God want us to share with Him. To come before him and share our heart: our needs, struggles, desires, and anything else that is happening. This is what our payer should look like. This is how we pray with purpose.