Matthew 6:1-15 (NASB)
“Take care not to practice your righteousness in the sight of people, to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven.
2 “So when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, so that they will be praised by people. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. 3 But when you give to the poor, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your charitable giving will be in secret; and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.
5 “And when you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they will be seen by people. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. 6 But as for you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door, and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.
7 “And when you are praying, do not use thoughtless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard because of their many words. 8 So do not be like them; for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him.
9 “Pray, then, in this way:
‘Our Father, who is in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. 10 Your kingdom come. Your will be done, On earth as it is in heaven. 11 Give us this day our daily bread. 12 And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13 And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil.’
14 For if you forgive other people for their offenses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive other people, then your Father will not forgive your offenses.
This section of Matthew is a continuation of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. He is giving His disciples, and everyone listening in the crowd, practical instructions on how to follow Him. Today, I mostly want to focus on the part that is known as the “Lord’s Prayer” but I always think it’s wise when looking at any part of scripture to first look at it in context.
A few verses earlier, in Matthew 5:16, Jesus tells us, “Your light must shine before people in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” But here in chapter 6 He says we must, “Take care not to practice your righteousness in the sight of people, to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven.” Some other translations use the words “good deeds” instead of righteousness. For example, the NKJV says, “charitable deeds” in this verse. If we are reading this verse in any of those translations, we might think Jesus is contradicting Himself. As always, if we take the time to understand the text, we see that He is not.
Looking at the Greek, we see that these words, which are sometimes translated into the same word, differ greatly from each other. The Greek word in chapter 5 for works, according to Strong’s Concordance, is ergon and it means “work, task, employment; a deed, action; that which is wrought or made, a work.” The Greek word for righteousness, here in Chapter 6 is dikaiosuné, and it means, “righteousness, justice.”
I see why some translators used charitable deeds or good works again in this verse, for then Jesus describes “good works.” He says, in Matthew 6:2-4, “So when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, so that they will be praised by people. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. But when you give to the poor, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your charitable giving will be in secret; and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.”
That is definitely a description of good works, so why does He say, “practice your righteousness,” instead? This word, dikaiosuné, is also found in Matthew 5:20, “For I say to you that unless your righteousness far surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.”
I think good works and righteousness are different and that is why Jesus says to let the good works shine, but practice righteousness in secret. Good works describe what we are outwardly doing. Righteousness describes our motivation. We are to do good works, meaning we are to obey God by regularly doing good for people. When we do that, God’s love will be shown to people and they will glorify God. Those good works will shine, they will be seen in the world. At the same time, though, we should not do those good works in such a way that we are drawing attention to ourselves. Our works should shine, but we should not. For if we are practicing good works for the sake of people glorifying us, then we will not get our reward from God and that is not really righteousness, it is merely good works. It seems like Jesus is distinguishing between doing good works so God will be glorified and His kingdom will be advanced, and us thinking we are being righteous and doing good deeds so we get noticed. Jesus says we must be righteous and give to the poor and do good deeds, but we shouldn’t do it in order to make a spectacle about it. If our motivation is for people to pat us on the back, then our motivation is wrong. Our motivation should be that God is glorified.
Jesus, like always, is most concerned with our inner motivation, or what some people refer to as “our hearts”. We might outwardly appear to be holy and pious, righteous and giving, but our insides could be corrupt and selfish, prideful and self-congratulatory. Jesus isn’t interested in that sort of righteousness.
In the same way, when we pray, we should be mindful of our motivation. He says in verse 5, “And when you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they will be seen by people. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.”
In the current state of our culture, this idea probably seems ridiculous to us. Who is going to stand on the street corner and pray loudly in order to gain people’s respect? Today, that won’t earn anyone respect. People passing by would probably scowl. Within Christian circles, I wonder if there is a more modern example of this? If Jesus was saying this in our age of social media, would He have said something like: don’t be like the hypocrites who love to post pictures on the internet of their good works so everyone applauds them.
Again, it’s not that we shouldn’t do these good works, no, of course not. We are to do good works. We are to give to the poor and, of course, we are to pray. Jesus is not saying not to do those things. He is saying: don’t do those things so that people will applaud you. If we give to the poor or support missionaries or help other people, we are not to announce it to everybody. We are to do these things secretly. Our good works will shine the light of God’s love without us needing to get the credit for it. Then those people we’ve helped, they will share that God has helped them. Those people can then point other people to God by saying, “Look what the Lord has done for me!” We, the agent of God’s love, should be anonymous in those situations. Our goal should not be for us to be given the credit or the recognition, but for God to be glorified.
Then Jesus tells us how we are to pray. Instead of making a public spectacle of prayer, He says, “6 But as for you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door, and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.”
Does this mean we should never pray publicly or corporately as in church? No, again, He is trying to make a point about not trying to get all the attention. And I think He is saying that we should have regular times of personal prayer with God. I think we might be shocked if we knew how little it is that people spend time in prayer. In the same way that few Christians have regular times of Bible reading, I think few Christians have regular times of personal prayer. If you find yourself in that camp, it is not too late to change. We can pray at any time and any place, and we don’t have to always go and pray inside an “inner room” in our house. If you commute to work, maybe the best time to pray is while driving. If you have a lot of gardening work to do, maybe your best time to pray is while mowing and weeding. Pray while you knit a sweater or do some other mindless work. If your mind races before sleep, maybe lying there in the dark is the perfect time to enter into prayer. The point Jesus is making is we should find a place where we are undistracted and can be mentally alone with Him. A place where we aren’t drawing undo attention to ourselves.
For prayer is the most important activity we can do. Jesus says that when we spend time in prayer, the Father will reward us. Not only do we have this promise of a reward in the future, but I believe we are rewarded now, in this present time as well. As we spend time in prayer, we are drawn closer to God. We learn to hear His voice, He softens our heart and He changes us to be more in tune with Him. Prayer might seem rather mystical and intangible sometimes, but I think if we could see what prayer accomplishes in the spirit world, we would be very eager to pray more.
Then Jesus says in verses 7 &8, “And when you are praying, do not use thoughtless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard because of their many words. So do not be like them; for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him.” All around the world, there are people who pray mindless chants to their gods. They repeat mantras, incantations, or memorized phrases. Jesus is saying that we are not to do this. Prayer is not a magic spell.
Jesus then gives an example of what a prayer should sound like. Ironically, some people have turned this example of a prayer into repetition. While memorizing scripture is always valuable and important, I don’t think that’s what Jesus intended by giving this prayer. I think He meant it to be a model, not a mandate. Let’s look at this prayer one verse at a time.
9 “Our Father, who is in heaven, hallowed be Your name.” The Greek word for hallowed is hagiazó, and it means to make holy, consecrate, sanctify. We are to start off prayer by calling on the One true God, addressing Him directly. We do not need to, and actually cannot, go through some other person like a saint. What an amazing privilege it truly is to talk to God directly. As we address Him, we are to treat Him with the honor and respect He is worthy of.
10 “Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” While I think we can interpret this plea for God’s kingdom to come to mean Jesus’ return to earth, I also think it can be understood as an appeal for all that encompasses the kingdom of Jesus to be here on earth now, with us. When we pray, “Your kingdom come” we mean, please let Your kingdom characteristics be here with us. What does that look like? One example is found in Matthew 12:28 when Jesus says, “But if I cast out the demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.”
Another example is in Luke 10:8&9, when Jesus says, “Whatever city you enter and they receive you, eat what is served to you; and heal those in it who are sick, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’”
Another is in Mark 12:32-34, “And the scribe said to Him, ‘Well said, Teacher; You have truly stated that He is One, and there is no other besides Him; and to love Him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the strength, and to love one’s neighbor as oneself, is much more than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices.’ When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently, He said to him, ‘You are not far from the kingdom of God.’ And then, no one dared any longer to question Him.”
Romans 14:17 Paul states, “for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.”
When we pray for God’s kingdom to come and His will to be done, we are praying that our world will see all these characteristics of God’s kingdom here on this earth. We are praying for God’s power to be shown, for people to be healed and delivered, for love for God and other people to be shown, and for righteousness, peace and joy to be on this earth.
We are also to pray for God’s will to be done. We are asking God to intervene in the world and accomplish things according to how He wants things to be done. It’s a plea for God to disregard the world’s wants and sinful desires and instead for Him to help us, and for Him to change our world to be the way He originally intended it to be.
Did you notice those first lines of prayer were about God? These next lines are now about our personal needs. Jesus shows us we are to pray for ourselves as well.
11 “Give us this day our daily bread.” While this is certainly a prayer for sufficient daily food, it is much more than that. We are to pray that God will provide all of our needs, not just what we are to eat. Under this umbrella of bread, we could pray for all physical provisions. Any need that we have, God wants us to bring it to Him. He is a God of relationship. He loves us and cares for us and wants us to bring any concern or need to Him. We are to look to Him to be our provider.
12 “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.” Some translations say “trespasses” instead of debts. The Greek word, according to Strong’s Concordance, is opheiléma which means, “that which is owed, a debt, offense, sin.” We are to ask Him to forgive us of our sin and we are to forgive those who have sinned against us.
13 “And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” Interestingly, a few years ago, the current Pope changed this part of the Lord’s Prayer. He changed the phrase from, “Lead us not into temptation” to “Do not let us fall into temptation.” He was quoted as saying, “I am the one who falls; it’s not him pushing me into temptation to then see how I have fallen.” I’m not a fan of the Pope’s change, for I don’t think we should change Scripture. Why would we think we can better say what Jesus has said? “Lead us not into temptation” is the same thing as saying, “Lead us away from temptation.” We are simply praying that the Lord leads us, and that He leads us not into, but away, from temptation.
I think Jesus intentionally included this particular phrase in the prayer for temptation was something that Jesus was very familiar with. In Luke 4:1-2 we read, “And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness for forty days, being tempted by the devil.” Those forty days of fasting and temptation were extremely taxing on Jesus. He is telling us to ask God to not lead us into places where we will face temptation. We should not alter what Jesus said. We can pray along with Jesus, “Do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”
It is important that we pray to be delivered from evil. The devil is real, and he wants to destroy us. Jesus is telling us to pray, “do not lead us into temptation, but lead us away from evil.”
Speaking of altering, if you have memorized the Lord’s Prayer, you might be mentally thinking, “For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever. Amen.” The NASB and other translations do not include this last phrase. There is a footnote in the NASB explaining the reason for its exclusion is because it was not found in the oldest manuscripts of the Bible. I did some reading on when it was added and no one seems to know for certain, other than it became a part of the liturgy at some point.
Then Jesus adds a promise and a warning: “14 For if you forgive other people for their offenses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive other people, then your Father will not forgive your offenses.”
If someone asks us to forgive them, we must forgive them. Jesus died on the cross in order to forgive us for our sin, surely we can forgive those who wrong us. For how can we, who have been forgiven of so much, withhold forgiveness from someone else? This foreshadows exactly what Jesus explains in His parable of the unmerciful servant. At the conclusion of the parable, Jesus says in Matthew 18:33-35, “Should you not also have had mercy on your fellow slave, in the same way that I had mercy on you? And his master, moved with anger, handed him over to the torturers until he would repay all that was owed him. My heavenly Father will also do the same to you, if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart.”
That is a severe warning, but if we follow these words of Jesus, we will be blessed. He will reward us. As Christians, not only do we have the hope of heaven and eternity with Jesus to look forward to, but we have the blessings He offers us now in this life. When we obey His words and love Him and others, when we meet with Him in prayer and ask for His help and forgiveness, when we follow His leading and rely on Him to help us overcome evil and sin, in all these things and more, when we walk this life with Him, we will find His blessings of His grace, love and presence with us.
Pray: Heavenly Father, we thank You that we can pray directly to You. We praise You, for You are the Holy One, the only living God. We ask that You would intervene in our world, our nation and each of our lives. Please show us Your power and heal the sick and set people free from bondage. Please let Your will be done. Thank You for all that You provide for us. Please continue to give us all that we need each day. Please bless us with health and abundance so we can give to others. Please forgive us for the wrong things we have done and help us not to hold on to the hurt that others have caused us. Help us to forgive as You have forgiven us. We pray that You would lead us away from temptations. Help us to walk according to Your path. Please set a guard around our eyes and minds so we do not fall into sin. Please protect us from the enemy. We pray that You would clothe us in Your armor so all his attacks would fail. We ask all this in Jesus’ name, amen.
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