After Jesus said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed: “Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you.” – John 17:1

Today’s Scripture Reading (November 24, 2017): John 17

It is called “The Lord’s Prayer.” It is fairly easily memorized although, as with most Bible passages, I seem to get a little messed up with it. Over the years I have memorized the prayer in three different translations, beginning with the “King James Version,” and then the “New International Version,” and most recently in the words of “The Message.” The Lord’s Prayer is said in some churches every week and in others more rarely. It is the subject of many skits and jokes. (My favorite anecdote about the Lord’s Prayer is the one about a child who tries to make sense of the words by praying it this way – Our Father, who hollers up in heaven, hello, what’s your name.) The prayer is easily recognizable by most people, whether they go to church or not. It is found in its most common form in Matthew 6.

              Our Father in heaven,

              Hallowed be your name,
              Your kingdom come, your will be done,
              On earth as it is in heaven.
              Give us today our daily bread.
              And forgive us our debts,
              As we also have forgiven our debtors.
              And lead us not into temptation,
              But deliver us from the evil one.’
                                                            Matthew 6:9-13 (NIV) 

The “deliver us from evil,” or “deliver us from the evil one” debate continues to rage, either probably could be the intent of the prayer. And for those of you who miss the “For Thine is the Kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever, Amen,” that appears to be a late addition to the prayer by a priest and not part of Jesus’s original words. They make the prayer sound more like a prayer; after all, every prayer has to end with “Amen” to be truly considered a prayer, right?

But the reality is that this prayer is not really “The Lord’s Prayer.” A better title might be “The Disciple’s Prayer.” It was a prayer given as a gift to the disciples in answer to their request – teach us to pray. This simple prayer is a model for us.

John 17 gives us a prayer that we often call “The High Priestly Prayer” but really this is the true “Lord’s Prayer.” It is a prayer that is prayed by Jesus, not as a model for us, but out of his anguish as the hour of Jesus’s death approaches. In it is a recognition of all of Jesus’s fears and hopes as the moment that he has been preparing for finally arrives. In this prayer, Jesus prays recognizing that, now, everything was in the hands of his Father. Jesus seems to understand that his life has now shrunk down to less than twenty-four hours. And most of the hours that he has left will not be pleasant ones. In this prayer, we find Jesus’s humanity, his questioning of the path – is there another way - and his worry over the disciples and those who would come after him. The question behind the words appears to be “Father, did I do enough?”

The answer to this question would come from the cross. As that hour came, the Father would glorify the Son, and the Son the Father, just as Jesus had asked as he began his prayer. And at that moment, Jesus would discover that point of enough.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Matthew 27