How Christ-Followers Are to Pray - Part 2

The Requests of Prayer

Hallowed Be Your Name

            I mentioned before how people can pray this prayer without really giving thought to what it means. It reminds me of children learning to pledge to the U.S. flag in school but not really understanding what it means until someone explains it, or upon reflection when they are older. Many have heard or prayed “hallowed be Your name” but do not have a clear idea of what this means. “Hallowed” carries the idea of being set part in an important way. We, if we are not careful, can approach prayer as if we are presenting a wish list to Santa Claus, whereas Jesus says our first priority is to be about God’s name, God’s honor, God’s reputation.

            Prayer, then, is about bringing glory to God, and God is honored (hallowed) when we praise Him and when He is seen to be at work through our prayers. In the book of John, we hear Jesus saying, “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.” When God’s people are answered by their Father in Heaven, people are able to see God for who He is. Pastor J. D. Greear tells of one of his experiences:

When I lived among Muslims in Southeast Asia, there were times I just didn’t know what to do or say to make Jesus known to them. So I’d offer to pray for sick people. I laid hands on dozens of people and prayed for them in Jesus’ name. Some of them got better. I’ll never forget the day a group of 12-year-old boys rang my doorbell so one could ask me to pray for his mother. I heard a kid in the back of the group say, “Why are you asking him to come? He’s not a Muslim.” The other boy said, “Yes, but this is a man God listens to.” (Greear, 233–234)

            Followers of Christ are to pray in order that God will be exalted as He does His mighty work. So our first request is “Hallowed be Your name.”

Your Kingdom Come, Your Will Be Done

            The next two requests continue with the priority of focusing on God, and they show that prayer is about aligning ourselves with God’s purposes. When Jesus Himself was facing His impending crucifixion, He went to a garden to pray, and this is what Matthew recounts:

Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane, and said to the disciples, “Sit here while I go and pray over there.” And He took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and He began to be sorrowful and deeply distressed. Then He said to them, “My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death. Stay here and watch with Me.”

He went a little farther and fell on His face, and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.”

Then He came to the disciples and found them sleeping, and said to Peter, “What! Could you not watch with Me one hour? Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

                Again, a second time, He went away and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I drink it, Your will be done.” (Matthew 26:36–42)

            Jesus was in agony over what He was about to face. Clearly His own desire was to avoid bearing sin on the cross and drinking the cup of wrath, but repeatedly, after pouring out His emotions, He submissively prays, “Your will be done.” If the Son of God struggled in prayer, it is to be expected that we will have to struggle in prayer at times. But prayer is meant to bring us to the place where, in drawing close to God with our inmost feelings, we can ultimately say that we want His will to be done.

            Praying for God’s kingdom to come entails a desire to see God at work in the lives of others, that His rule in the hearts of people will be advanced, but it also entails a desire for Christ to come again and rule on earth in His righteous kingdom. Followers of Christ should desire that more and more people will be brought into right relationship with the King of Heaven and be prepared for His rule on earth. I am happy to say I have seen God tremendously answer prayer for His work in changing people’s lives. On the other hand, when we pray with wrong, self-centered motives, we cannot expect that prayer to be answered. This explains why people who blame God for not answering prayer have a misconception of how God works. Jesus says prayer is not for expecting whatever we may wish but for aligning ourselves with God’s purposes and praying for Him to bring about what He deems best: “Your kingdom come, Your will be done.”

Works Cited:

J. D. Greear, Gospel: Rediscovering the Power that Made Christianity Revolutionary (Nashville: B & H Publishing Group, 2011).

All Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1979, 1980, 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.