THE PERFECT PRAYER TO PRAY EACH DAY
Lysa TerKeurst
Did you know Jesus has given us the perfect prayer to pray each day to help us get ahead of any offenses that may be coming our way?
In Matthew 6, we read about Jesus teaching the disciples how to pray, more commonly known as the Lord’ s Prayer. There’ s so much He could teach us to include in our daily prayers, right? I mean, if I were tasked with the job of teaching others how to pray, I’ m afraid I may have included all the wrong things and left out some really important things.
And you know what I may have been tempted to minimize or exclude? The very parts Jesus seems to emphasize the most— confession and forgiveness. In Matthew 6:9-13, Jesus teaches:
“ This, then, is how you should pray:‘ Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’”
And then in the next two verses right after the Lord’ s Prayer, Jesus adds:“ For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins”( Matthew 6:14-15).
Here’ s something I don’ t want us to miss. If you are looking at the word count of this teaching as presented in the New International Version, the total teaching is 94 words. The importance of giving and receiving forgiveness makes up almost half of those words. Wow.
This grabs my attention and makes me want to lean in a little more to what Jesus asks us to
26