Some Thoughts on The Lord's Prayer ( part 1 of 2 ) - Ministry Videos

My sister asked, "Why did you do this", so I took the time to write out the reason and I thought you might like to know also:

Lying in bed one night saying that prayer it hit me like a ton of bricks that it opened with a greeting followed by a praise. I remember thinking about what I had read previously that it was off-the-cuff, in response to a disciple's asking, "teach us to pray".
I was impressed by the organization and then went to sleep. The next night or two the same sort of thing happened and extended into the revelation of "give us this day" being a time frame for which we are asking. I said "wow, that's interesting" and went to sleep thinking, "hmm, maybe I better say it every day".
Then another time (and I don't remember if it was the next night or what, I mean I wasn't possessed by this) it hit me that "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive others" is literally begging to be treated with respect to forgiveness with no more mercy than that we extend to others. That's when I really felt spooked. I remember saying to myself, "where has this understanding been all my life". Had I known as a kid, the hundreds of times that I prayed this prayer, that that is what I was asking, I would either not have said the prayer or else treated people a lot better.
About that time it dawned on me that I am probably not the only one who has been stupid enough to pray for only the forgiveness that I extend to others, and not even listen to what I was asking. "Uh, Oh", I thought. Am I supposed to share this? "No way, not me, that would mean standing up in church in front of everybody. It aint gonna happen. Nuff said. Besides, what if I am way off base with my interpretation? What if scholars have already said something different?"
But then it kept coming and coming until finally one day I ran across a book called "The Layman's guide to The Lor