“Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.”

How do you describe prayer? 

Social gospel activist Vida Dutton Scudder said, “If prayer is the deep secret creative force that Jesus tells us it is, we should be very busy with it.”

A deep, secret, creative force. 

When you settle in to pray, wherever and whenever you pray, do you say to yourself–“I am about to connect with a deep, secret, creative force”? I’d wager not. But perhaps we should. Perhaps that is what Jesus was getting at in this passage. We usually think that this story is simply where Luke shows us the origin of what has become known as The Lord’s Prayer, which is part of our religious and even cultural DNA. This prayer also appears in slightly different form in Matthew’s Gospel, although in the context of the Sermon on the Mount, which broadly addresses multiple aspects of a life of faith and discipleship. By contrast, Luke has something different–and particular–in mind with the way he sets the prayer that is the focus of this passage. He wants his audience to understand the “deep secret creative force” of prayer.

Why? 

Consider the time in which Luke was writing. It was late in the first century, in the aftermath of the First Jewish Revolt; within a decade or two of the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple by the Romans. Unrest remained during the so-called; second revolt was to come in a few decades. Beginning in the year 64 CE, the followers of The Way of Jesus were targets of persecutions which would continue periodically for over two centuries. 

This was the historical context in which Luke wrote his Gospel and Acts. His community lived in a dangerous time–they were like sheep among wolves. So, Luke’s project was to encourage his audience–to equip them to confront and withstand the principalities, powers and persecutions that they faced. 

Now, hear the beginning of the passage again: 

“Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.”

Have you ever wondered why John the Baptist was part of this conversation between Jesus and his disciples? Why would Luke want to remind his audience of John the Baptist? Why not just have the disciples say, “Lord, teach us to pray” and leave it at that? 

What is it about John the Baptist? 

He had been a prophet popular among the Jewish people, baptizing at the Jordan, calling everyone to repentance and calling Temple authorities a brood of vipers. He stirred things up. The Romans didn’t like having things stirred up. Furthermore, and most crucial, John had been a thorn in the imperial side. His criticism of Herod the Tetrarch’s improper marriage had resulted in John’s arrest, and landed his head on a platter.

The death of a prophet at the hands of a Roman Tetrarch would be a wee sore point for Jesus and his followers. 

“Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.”

How might John–he of camel hair, locusts, wild honey, ‘you brood of vipers!’, and ‘Herod, your marriage is illegitimate’–have taught his disciples to pray?

“Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come…”

According to New Testament scholar Amy Jill Levine, the Caesars in Rome liked to be known as father. Imagine what they would think if they knew that people were praying, not to the emperor, but to God, the Holy One? Saying, in effect, that there is only one Father, Caesar, and you’re not it? And that the dominion–kingdom–that we invoke has nothing to do with the Roman imperium and everything to do with the reign of God? And that the Father to whom we pray actually frees us from any earthly dominion, especially Rome’s? How might that go over?

We can only imagine.

Prayer is subversive.

“Give us each day our daily bread”: A deceptively simple line, that has been interpreted variously as a simple request for sufficient bodily nourishment or as a prophetic vision of the Messianic banquet. But, rather than an ‘either/or’ interpretation, what if it is a ‘both/and’ prayer that imagines bread as both bodily nourishment that equips us for our work of healing the world and as a foretaste of God’s heavenly table? What if we ask God to feed our bodies and our prophetic imagination? Give us what we need, Father, to make your Dream a reality.

Prayer is visionary; a “creative force.”

Forgive us, Father, as we forgive others, and do not bring us to the time of trial. “The time of trial” is a clearer reading than what many of us grew up with. “Lead us not into temptation,” muddies the waters with an overly broad conception of the many ways in which we can be led astray. From a narrower and more accurate first century perspective, protection “from the time of trial” would apply to those facing religious persecution or abuse who might be tempted to betray their faith or their people. Save us from the time of trial, Father; keep us steadfast in our faith.

Prayer is courageous.

Teach us.

Give us.

Forgive us.

Do not bring us.

We almost miss the pronouns.

Us.

This was a prayer for the community, for the people of God; and not just as they saw themselves in their own religious bubble, but as they were living, struggling, and transforming in the context of their time and the world around them; a world in the wake of brutal defeat, a world under Roman occupation. 

This is how John the Baptist would teach his disciples to pray. Subversively, creatively, and in companionship with one another.

The Lord’s Prayer that Jesus teaches in Luke’s Gospel is, as we’ve seen, a particular kind of Lord’s Prayer, but it is certainly not confined to its particular time. It remains to this day focused on the unfolding Dream of God as it breaks into a scarred and scared world. 

“Lord, teach us to pray…”

Jesus tells us to ask, seek, and knock, and to do it persistently, presumptuously, audaciously, and shamelessly, like the neighbor who utterly disregards their friend’s sleep schedule. This is not because God is uninformed as to what we need. Like a good parent, God knows our needs full well–better than we do– and deeply desires for us to be equipped with what is necessary for our flourishing and for the work that God calls us to do. But we are still called to ask, seek, and knock. Why? Because the very action of doing those things is tangible hope–the beginning of the realization of that for which we ask, seek, and knock. 

Listen to biblical storyteller Richard Swanson’s translation: 

“For everyone asking is receiving. The one who is seeking is finding. To the one knocking it is being opened.”

Prayer is hopeful. 

Praying is hoping.

And for the sake of the world, “…we should be very busy with it.”