Worship as Dialogue: Prayer
Our worship service is a conversation between God and us. God speaks to us by his Word in Scripture and moves upon us by his Holy Spirit in inwardly apply the grace of the gospel. He engages us not just in our minds, but in all of our senses to confirm that we are not our own, but we belong to Him and that He is for us. And we are reoriented to see our lives in light of God’s redeeming work.
In the previous posts we’ve looked at how God gets the first word in the Call to Worship, how this call pulls us out from ourselves to sing—not perform—with one voice to his glory and our good, how God continues to assure us of his love for us as we confess our sin, how our hearts/minds are reshaped as we confess our faith, and how as God’s gathered and cleansed people, we open our mouths to bless the children among us. That brings us to the next aspect of our worship service: Prayer.
In our church, our time of Prayer is always directly after The Blessing of the Children, and I often say after that blessing that “in a sense all church is children’s church, because we all call upon God as Father, bringing nothing in our hands
Prayer as not just a psychological exercise to make us feel better. Prayer is the speaking to God where we recognize that we are heard and never alone. Our time of prayer begins with the words of the Lord’s Prayer, given by Jesus to teach his disciples how to pray. We not only recite pray together the words of the Lord’s Prayer, but as the pastor prayers for our church his prayer is structured by the form of the Lord’s Prayer. Meaning that our words of prayer are not only in response to the glory and goodness of God that we have already experienced in worship, but also led by his instruction.
In other words, by praying the Lord’s Prayer and allowing it to guide what we pray for, we are allowing our prayers to be trained by Jesus.
When we pray ‘Our Father,’ we call to him in the intimacy of being his children.
When we pray that his name be hallowed, we ask that who he truly is will be made much of.
When we pray for his kingdom to come we ask that the reign of his grace and righteousness to take greater root here in Dunn.
When we pray for our ‘daily bread’, we ask for ends to meet and health, so that we can be equipped with all we need to see that kingdom come and love others well.
When we pray for forgiveness and to forgive others, we ask that our forgiveness of others will match his forgiveness of us.
When we pray for protection from temptation and deliverance from evil, we ask that the truth of the gospel will drown out the lies that we so often believe.
And we pray all of this in confidence: because his is the kingdom that is coming, not our own. His is the power in which it will happen, not our own. And to him belongs the glory forever.