Do You Dare Pray the Lord’s Prayer?
Quite a
while ago I heard a teacher say something like this: If we knew what we were asking when we pray
the Lord’s prayer, we wouldn’t dare pray it!
Let’s skip
over the obvious “Thy will be done…” (note that it implies adding “in me”), and
consider the phrase “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass
against us” (or sins, or debts, whichever you prefer).
The word “as”
is the joker here. It seems to me that
it can have two meanings. The first, and
most obvious, is “in the same way that”.
So “Forgive us our sins in the same way that we forgive those who sin
against us”?!! I certainly don’t want
THAT! All too often, I’m not very
forgiving. So if this is the primary
meaning, I’m asking God NOT to forgive my sins a goodly portion of the time.
The other
meaning that pops up for “as” is the word “because”. “Forgive me my sins because I have already
forgiven those who sin against me.” But
all too often, I haven’t. So again, I’m
asking God NOT to forgive my sins a goodly portion of the time.
Further, in
Matthew’s version of the Lord’s Prayer [6:9-10], Jesus immediately follows it
by saying, “For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father
will also forgive you. But if you do not
forgive, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”
So DO you
dare pray the Lord’s Prayer? Do you dare
not to pray it?
I’ll
continue to pray it with fear and trembling, being aware of my shortcomings but
also aware of God’s love and mercy. And
I expect that as I pray it with awareness of what I’m asking, I will gradually
grow in my ability to forgive others.
Gary+
Hi Gary. One of your fans, Alice Nixon, passed this post on to me. I told her I would post this comment - another way to translate "forgive us our trespasses/sins just as we forgive those who trespass/sin against us. I think it is okay to read this phrase less literally, or with a broader understanding as "just as".
ReplyDeleteHere was my reply to Alice....
Indeed. I think I would add on to that. In fact, I should probably go to Gary's blog and offer a comment.
I read this as: "Just as we know/experience compassion toward mistakes and failures at the human level, please let us know Your compassion, O God."
In the Aramaic, "Forgive us our sins/debts" can be translated variously:
Loose the cords of mistakes binding us
Untangle the knots within
Absorb our frustrated hopes an dreams
Forgive our hidden past / our secret shames
And "as we forgive those who sin against us" can be translated:
as we release the strands we hold of other's guilt
so that we can mend our heart's simple ties to others
as we embrace the frustrated hopes and dreams of others
as we continuously forgive what others hide
But I don't see the "just as" principle as a tit-for-tat limitation on God's compassion, mercy, or forgiveness. I don't even see is as a model of how we want God to be compassionate (ei, "do it this way - the way humans do it"). I think that is probably an over-literalization of the words. I think God's compassion, mercy, and forgiveness are unconditional - not dependent on how good we are at it ourselves. So I read this as a prayer that opens us to both giving and receiving compassion and forgiveness, and even asking for God to show compassion on those who have hurt us. As more like, "may compassion flow between us humans and between God and humanity. May it flow toward us, through us, and from us with every breath we breathe for the sake of restoring us to our original state with one another." (The Aramaic word for "forgive" can just mean "restore us to our original state".)
If God's forgiveness is unconditional (and I think I agree with you here), how do you deal with the words of Jesus: "...if you do not forgive, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses"?
ReplyDelete