Introduction
“Our Father, who art in heaven…”
These are powerful opening words in many communities that I am a part of. Honestly, it’s really just the first two words. “Our Father…”
It’s a cue, a signal, for everyone around to join in as they wish. We will bow our heads. Some couple’s and friends may even hold hands. This prayer is familiar, a communal tradition that we do every Sunday.
Many AA meetings will end with the Lord’s prayer. The person leading the meeting will invite everyone into a circle and begin, “Our Father.” And we all join in sharing these familiar words.
There have been a few times when I have visited members in hospice or those who have memory loss. The conversations and questions that I share with those persons can be difficult and frustrating because so much of their memory has escaped them. But when I begin with the words, “Our Father, who art in heaven” often the words of this familiar prayer come to them and pour out of them with a familiarity that is nothing short of miraculous considering all that they have forgotten.
These words are more than just familiar to so many of us. They are engrained deep within our hearts. They’re so familiar that we could say it without thinking about it.
Narrative Context
“Lord, teach us to pray…”
Seeing Jesus praying, the disciples ask Jesus how to pray. And what Jesus gives them isn’t a set of techniques or spiritual rules, he gives them words. Words they can say again and again, words they can share, words that tether them to God when they don’t know what else to pray. Words that will tether them to each other and ultimately to all who will follow in the way.
The Lord’s Prayer in Luke is a bit shorter than the one many of us know by heart from Matthew or from worship, but the heart of it is all there. And perhaps that’s the point. This isn’t about performance. This is about grounding. This prayer is not transactional, it’s transformational. It doesn’t tell us how to get what we want from God. It teaches us to trust that God is already acting in the world and in our lives. It invites us into a posture of dependence, hope, and faith that the reign of God is breaking in around us and through us.
The Power Behind Every Line and Every Meaning
But the power of this prayer is that these same words, mean such different things for so many of us.
Let’s take it piece by piece.
“Father…” The prayer starts with relationship, not transaction. Not “O distant Creator,” not “O High and Mighty One,” but “Father.” Or in the Aramaic Jesus spoke, something even more familiar, like “Abba.” It’s not formal. It’s intimate. This is how Jesus sees God. As a close and caring parent, one who listens, provides, and loves.
“Hallowed be your name.” In other words: may your name be known and honored and holy. Not by force, not through fear, but because of how you act in love and mercy. Because of who you are.
“Your kingdom come.” For Luke, this is a prayer for a new world. A prayer for the systems of injustice to crumble. For the lowly to be lifted. For swords to be beaten into plowshares. For all the brokenness we see in our headlines and in our hearts to be transformed by God’s reign of peace and justice. And when we pray for that kingdom to come, we’re also opening ourselves up to be part of its coming.
“Give us each day our daily bread.” Just enough for today. Not for the week or the year, just for this moment. This is a radical kind of trust. Jesus invites us to pray like the Israelites gathering manna in the wilderness: one day at a time. And again, notice the “us.” Not “give me my daily bread,” but us. This is a prayer for the whole community. It’s an invitation to care about whether others have enough, too. In Martin Luther’s small catechism, he reminds us that this could be so many things: food, drink, clothing, shoes, house, fields, money, employment, property, someone for us to love and someone to love us, faithful rulers, good government, good weather, peace, health, decency, honor, good friends, faithful neighbors. Give us this day, our daily bread. Give us all what we need to survive and thrive.
“Forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone indebted to us.”
Forgiveness might be the hardest part of this prayer. It’s not as simple as saying “I forgive you” and moving on. Forgiveness takes time. It can be painful. And sometimes we confuse forgiveness with excusing abuse or forgetting trauma. That’s not what Jesus is asking here.
Forgiveness doesn’t mean pretending the harm didn’t happen. It means refusing to let the harm define us forever. It means stepping into the risky, vulnerable space of trusting that God’s mercy is bigger than our pain and deeper than our grudges.
And remember, Jesus is teaching this prayer in the middle of his ministry, surrounded by people who are being crushed by debt, taxed by empire, executed for protesting, and excluded from religious power. This kind of forgiveness isn’t just personal, it’s political. It’s a radical act of liberation, a vision of a world where debts are released and wrongs are healed, and cycles of revenge are broken. That kind of forgiveness only makes sense in light of the in-breaking kingdom of God. A kingdom not of fairness, but of grace.
“Do not bring us to the time of trial.”
This is a line about temptation, testing, and endurance. It’s a plea that God would shield us when we’re most vulnerable, when faith is hard to hold onto, when fear and fatigue overwhelm us. Some translations say “save us from the time of trial,” others say “do not put us to the test.” Either way, it’s a cry for help from the One we trust to be with us in our weakness and vulnerability. At times when we know we cannot do it on our own.
The power of this prayer is that even though we are saying the same words, each of us and each of our communities may praying for widely different things.
The Prayer of All Times and All Places
This is one of the oldest prayers that we have from the Christian community. For over two thousand years the community of Christ has lifted these words up in hundreds of different languages and for millions of different reasons.
Every day of our lives (not just Sundays), millions of people across the world lift these words up to God.
Our Father, who art in heaven.
Hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done.
Every time we speak these words, we lift our prayers with every person who has prayed them before us, all who pray them around us, and all who will pray them after us. Lifting our voices together, praying for the whole world.
It is not unthinkable that at any given moment of every single day there is someone in the world praying these words.
A persistent prayer. A constant prayer to God.
Constantly keeping vigil for all the prayers of the world.
Praying without ceasing.
That is power of these words. When we utter them, we are praying all the prayers, all the meanings, all the intercessions, all the intentions, of everyone who has come before us. And the same is true of our intentions, our prayers. Even when we cannot or are unable to pray, our prayers are still rising up, through these words from the community of Christ in all places.
It’s beautiful, it’s powerful, it’s overwhelmingly cosmic.
But for me, it’s such a relief to know that it’s not all on me. As a community of Christ, we share these prayers, knowing that the persistent chorus of voices is always sharing them with us. Like the chorus of angels, with church on earth, and the hosts of heaven, we pray these unending words. When this prayer already carries with it so much meaning, it is not necessary for us to put so much weight on what we are praying for but we also shouldn’t just go on auto-pilot.
The Short Parable
Jesus doesn’t stop with just the words. He keeps teaching with a story: someone pounding on their neighbor’s door at midnight. It’s almost comedic. Who wakes up a whole household for a loaf of bread? But the point isn’t etiquette. It’s persistence. Jesus tells us that if even a sleepy friend will eventually get up to help, how much more will God, who never sleeps or slumbers (Psalm 121), respond in love?
This isn’t a picture of God as annoyed or reluctant. It’s the opposite. God is eager to respond. “Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened.” Those aren’t promises that God will give us everything we ask for. They are promises that God is already near, already listening, already at work. And prayer is the way we join in that nearness.
Preaching Possibilities
What are you praying for this week?
Many of us say the Lord’s Prayer every week, maybe even every day. But how often do we actually listen to the words we’re praying?
This week is a chance to invite your community to do just that. Maybe your sermon names how this prayer forms us over time. Maybe you share a story of a moment when this prayer held you together. Maybe you offer a way to pray it slowly, one line each day, and ask: Which line do you need most right now? Which line is hardest to pray? Which words do you need the saints around you to carry for you when you can’t say them yourself?
Because when we say “our Father,” we’re not just speaking to God. We’re linking arms with each other. We’re praying for things we might not even be able to believe in fully on our own: forgiveness, provision, the coming of a just and merciful kingdom. This prayer is not just a personal devotion, it’s a communal act of faith.
So, invite people to listen closely this week. Invite them to let the words of this prayer shape not just their piety, but their priorities. Invite them to wonder: What do I want this community to hold for me? And what might God be shaping in us together as we pray?
One of my Favorite Martin Luther Writings
Martin Luther has a whole host of writings on the Lord’s Prayer and what the words mean. But today, I would like to leave you with his final writing, on the Little Word Amen.
Luther writes,
“Therefore, the little word “Amen” means the same as truly, verily, certainly. It is a word uttered by the firm faith of the heart. It is as though you were to say, “O my God and Father, I have no doubt that you will grant the things for which I petitioned, not because of my prayer, but because of your command to me to request them and because of your promise to hear me. I am convinced, O God, that you are truthful, that you cannot lie. It is not the worthiness of my prayer, but the certainty of your truthfulness, that leads me to believe this firmly. I have no doubt that my petition will become and be an Amen.”[1]
[1] Martin Luther, Exposition on the Lord’s Prayer.
Micah Krey 
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