The Lord’s Prayer with Emphasis Placed on “Your will be done (on earth as it is in heaven)“ This third reflection on the Lord’s Prayer guides our thoughts as we seek to understand the Father’s will and directs our actions as we strive to follow the will of the Father. […] Read more
The Lord’s Prayer with Emphasis Placed on “Your kingdom come (on earth as it is in heaven).” This second reflection on the Lord’s Prayer helps us better understand the Father’s present and emerging kingdom for which we pray. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. – Let your kingdom, […] Read more
The Lord’s Prayer with Emphasis Placed on “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.” This first reflection shows the entire Lord’s Prayer as a litany of praise as we pray and meditate on the many ways in which the Father’s name — his nature and his character — is […] Read more
I usually walk my dog each day along one of the many local park trails and I allow my mind to wander. One day I found myself thinking about a lesson I learned during my time in the theater: the meaning of any sentence is largely determined by where the […] Read more
The words from the Lord’s Prayer ripple, not only through the pages of Matthew’s Gospel but also through the most famous of Jesus’s sermons, the Sermon on the Mount. When Jesus sat down on the mountaintop to teach, I doubt that his disciples grasped the full breadth and depth of […] Read more
The previous post summarized how Matthew’s Gospel helps inform us how to better pray the Lord’s Prayer, and specifically, it was focused on the first four statements of the Lord’s Prayer. The traditional approach to the Lord’s Prayer categorizes each statement as a petition, but such a categorization seems to […] Read more
A number of years ago, in the hopes that I might learn a bit more about prayer, I began studying the disciples’ request in Luke 11:1, “Lord, teach us to pray,” and Jesus’s answer in Luke 11:2-4, the Lord’s Prayer. It wasn’t long before I felt compelled to reread the […] Read more
If Matthew had been recording the story of any other person, after the tomb was sealed, all he would have to write about would be the lives of Jesus’s friends over the next few days, months, and years. Such a story could possibly go on after their deaths, but eventually, […] Read more
Jesus, beaten senselessly, bleeding profusely, and stripped naked hangs on the cross for the world to see. Many people mock him, some ignore him, and his closest friends, those who were actually present, mourned him. Matthew writes, 45 Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land until […] Read more
Our deliverance from evil has been secured by means of Jesus’s deliverance unto evil. Matthew writes, 11 Now Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus said, “You have said so.” 12 But when he was accused by the chief priests and […] Read more