“Give us this day our daily bread”; because our material body, necessary support of the spirit, needs every day a little material food to maintain it. We do not ask of Thee riches, dangerous burden, but only that small amount which permits us to live, to become more worthy of the promised life. Man does not live by bread alone, and yet without a morsel of bread the soul, living in the body, could not nourish itself on other things more precious than bread.
“Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” Pardon us because we pardon others. Thou art our eternal and infinite creditor. We can never pay our debt to Thee, but remember that because of our weakness, it is more of an effort for us to forgive one single debt of a single one of our debtors than it is for Thee to sweep away the record of all that we owe Thee.
“Lead us not into temptation.” We are weak, still snared in fleshliness in this world which at times seems so beautiful and calls us to all the delights of faithlessness. Help us that our struggling transformation may not be too difficult, and that our entry into the Kingdom may not be too long delayed.
“Deliver us from evil”—Thou who art in Heaven, who art spirit, who hast power over evil, over stubborn and hostile matter which surrounds us everywhere, and from which it is hard to free ourselves, Thou enemy of Satan, negation of matter, help us! Our true greatness lies in this victory over evil, over evil which springs up constantly because it will not be truly conquered until all have conquered it. But this decisive victory will be less distant if Thou helpest us with Thy alliance.
With this appeal for aid, the Lord’s Prayer ends. In it are none of the tiresome blandishments of Oriental prayers, rigmaroles of adulation and hyperbole which seem invented by a dog, adoring his master with his dog’s soul, because his master permits him to exist and to eat. There are none of the querulous, complaining supplications of the Psalmist who asks God for every variety of aid, more often temporal than spiritual, laments if the harvest has not been good, if his fellow-citizens do not respect him, and calls down wounds and arrows on the enemies whom he cannot conquer himself. In the Lord’s Prayer the only word of praise is the word “Father”; and that praise is a pledge, a testimony of love. From this father we ask only for a little bread, and we ask in addition the same pardon that we give our enemies; and at the last a valid protection in our fight with evil, the enemy of all, the great wall which hinders our entry into the Kingdom.
He who says “Our Father” is not proud but neither is he humbled; he speaks to his Father with the intimate quiet accent of confidence almost as from one equal to another. He is sure of his love and he knows that his father needs no long speeches to know his desires. “Your Father,” says Jesus, “knoweth what things ye have need of before ye ask Him.” Thus the most beautiful of all the prayers is a daily calling to mind of all that we need if we are to become like God.
POWERFUL DEEDS
After He had given out the new law of the imitation of God, Jesus came down from the Mount.
One cannot always remain on the heights. The moment we arrive on the summit of a mountain we are fated to descend. Every ascent is a pledge of descent, a promise to come down again. He who has something to say must make himself heard; if he always speaks on the summits, few will stay with him; it is cold on the summits for those who are not all on fire; and his voice will reach few. He who has come to give, cannot ask men, weak lungs, tired hearts, nerveless legs, to follow him upward, hobbling along to the heights. He must follow them down to the plain, into their houses; he must stoop to them if he is to lift them up.
Jesus knew that exalted teaching on the heights would not suffice to spread the good news to all. He knew that men need less abstract words, picture-making words, narrated words, words almost as tangible as facts. And He knew that even these words would not be enough.