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Okay, last week we finished chapter ten of Luke and so let’s turn to chapter 11 and get into the next chapter.
Luke 11.1-13
November 24th 2019
Meat
Luke 11:1 And it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.
2 And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth.
3 Give us day by day our daily bread.
4 And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.
5 And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves;
6 For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him?
7 And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee.
8 I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth.
9 And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.
10 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.
11 If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?
12 Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?
13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?
Okay, back to verse 1.
Luke 11:1 And it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.
The Gospel of Luke is interesting in that he, presumably by the Holy Spirit, decided to note Jesus praying more than other Gospel accounts.
Therefore we read that Jesus was praying at his baptism (in Luke 3:21); in the wilderness (in Luke 5:16); and in Luke 6:12 we noted that before the appointment of the apostles He spent the entire night in prayer.
Luke 9:18 has him praying alone; and prior to his transfiguration Luke tells us that He went up to pray. (Luke 9:28-29).
What we read here in Luke is told differently in Matthew and the reason for this is it appears that the setting was different – meaning these two teachings were given at different times and places.
Just for the sake of comparison and information, Jesus teaching the apostles to pray in Matthew is set in chapter 6 – which is part of the beatitudes – and there he says more than he does in Luke, including:
5 And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.
7 But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.
8 Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him.
9 After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.
10 Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
11 Give us this day our daily bread.
12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.
As a direct comparison, these are the differences between the Matthew and the Luke accounts:
9 Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.
10 Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done (all the same but then we come to the first negligible difference as Matthew writes, “in earth, as it is in heaven.”
11 Give us this day our daily bread.
12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil:
Totally added in Matthew or eliminated in Luke:
For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.
Additionally, and perhaps I am missing something here, but in Matthew Jesus was teaching His apostles. Here in Luke it says that “His disciples came to him” and said, “teach us how to pray.”
Admittedly, this could have still been referring to the apostles, but this was a different setting and so it could be referring to his followers instead.
It may be in this Luke account that the disciples had seen Jesus praying so often that they wanted him to instruct them on how to do it – as John had apparently taught His disciples how to pray.
It would be interesting to read what John taught as compared to Jesus, but we have no record of what John conveyed to his followers.
Verse 2
2 And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth.
We won’t go into it but a number of the phrases Jesus uses come from terms that were in common use among the Jews.
The prayer itself poses a problem for biblical literalists because no where does Jesus say that this is just an example or model, and if we are to take the Bible literally, then every prayer ought to be exactly like this one.
We can stand by the model of prayer theory here for one because nowhere do we read in Acts or the epistles that any of the disciples recited this prayer verbatim.
Plus we see differences – though subtle – between the Matthew version and Lukes.
But one thing I find as extremely important in both accounts is Jesus Himself says:
“When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven,”
This is how Jesus taught – in both Matthew and Luke – who people were to pray to – Our Father . . . which art (WHO IS) in heaven.
We note that He did not teach them to pray to Him or to the Holy Spirit. Now I know that people today have come up with all sorts of reasons why it is fine to pray to Jesus and or to the Holy Spirit.
But I’ve got to admit, if I can say this, it has never felt “right” to me.
I’ve tried it – done it – but I think that the practice is the natural result of creedal Trinitarianism. Looking to what Jesus clearly and plainly taught, we pray to His “The” “Our” Father in heaven.
The only change or addition to this prayer model that Jesus provides comes later in John’s Gospel where we read on several occasions to do things in Jesus name.
So while we note that in neither Matthew’s account nor Luke’s does Jesus teach them to include His name in the prayer, we discover the following in John’s Gospel which is 90% unique to the synoptics and has Jesus say things like:
Joh 14:13-14 And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it.
And then 12 verses later we read (in John 14:26)
But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.
And then in John 15:16 Jesus says:
“Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.”
And then in the next chapter (John 16:23) Jesus says “And in that day ye shall ask me nothing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you.”
And then finally, and interestingly, in John 16 Jesus admits to something strange. Something that appears to say that He will not always be making intercession for us before the Father as He says to His chosen Apostles:
John 16:25 These things have I spoken unto you in proverbs: but the time cometh, when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but I shall shew you plainly of the Father.
26 At that day ye shall ask in my name: and I say not to you that I will pray the Father for you:
27 For the Father himself loveth you, because ye have loved me, and have believed that I came out from God.
Interesting huh?
In any case, let’s get back to what is known as the Lord’s prayer here in Luke.
We can see the way to pray unfolds to us in scripture; that Jesus first teaches his apostles/disciples to pray to the Father in heaven without mentioning himself.
Then we note that in John Jesus teaches them to do and/or ask the father for all things “in His name.”
And then finally, we learn that Jesus even tells his apostles that there will come a time when He will not petition or pray to the father on their behalf because, he says:
“For the Father himself loveth you, because ye have loved me, and have believed that I came out from God.”
In my estimation, this day and times speaks of our age for sure, where Jesus has done all things necessary to reconcile the world to His Father, and, as 1st Corinthians 15 says, the time has come where he no longer resides at His right hand as mediator but God is now all in all.
Nevertheless, to each person their own as most are comfortable praying to the Father in Jesus name by way of training and tradition.
So Jesus says (again)
When ye pray, say, “Our Father which art in heaven,”
“Hallowed be thy name.”
Holy is your name. What is the Father’s name? We don’t rightly know. We get have the consonants of His name
YHWH
And have assumed to know how that name is pronounced. YAH-WHEY
That is conjecture. And so I stand by what Jesus says: His name is holy. Then Jesus says:
“Thy kingdom come.”
Adam Clarke notes that the ancient Jews had a saying that said:
“He prays not at all, in whose prayers there is no mention of the kingdom of God.”
Why? Because the Kingdom of God, coming to reign over the earth with its promised Messiah was at the heart of every Jew to speedily appear and establish itself on earth.
This expectation went all the way back to Daniel where the sway of the sceptre of Christ is described as reigning over all kingdoms in heaven and earth. Because of the wording most Christians believe the fulfillment of the passages remain in the future, but a contextual reading of the following description, especially against the Book of Revelation AND the insights from secular history provides some pretty sound proof that what Daniel describes was being fulfilled in Jesus day and was fulfilled within a generation of His ministry. It says (beginning at verse 14 of Daniel 7):
14 And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.
15 ¶ I Daniel was grieved in my spirit in the midst of my body, and the visions of my head troubled me.
16 I came near unto one of them that stood by, and asked him the truth of all this. So he told me, and made me know the interpretation of the things.
17 These great beasts, which are four, are four kings, which shall arise out of the earth.
18 But the saints of the most High shall take the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever.
19 Then I would know the truth of the fourth beast, which was diverse from all the others, exceeding dreadful, whose teeth were of iron, and his nails of brass; which devoured, brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with his feet;
20 And of the ten horns that were in his head, and of the other which came up, and before whom three fell; even of that horn that had eyes, and a mouth that spake very great things, whose look was more stout than his fellows.
21 I beheld, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them;
22 Until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom.
23 Thus he said, The fourth beast shall be the fourth kingdom upon earth, which shall be diverse from all kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down, and break it in pieces.
24 And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings that shall arise: and another shall rise after them; and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings.
25 And he shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.
26 But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end.
27 And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.
So when Jesus prays, “thy Kingdom come,” which again was a standard prayerful hope of every Jews, it was directly tied to the next thing he says,
“THY WILL BE DONE ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN.”
The full meaning in this prayer Jesus offers is, Father, send your Kingdom forward so that your will, which is done in heaven, will be done on earth too.
Remember, Jesus was praying for this state to occur within the confines of the coming Kingdom – by those who are part of it. In other words, IN this coming Kingdom that Jesus prayed for, His fathers will would be done here on earth as it is in heaven.
Where there is a kingdom defined and established there is a place outside the Kingdom. Where there is a Kingdom there are inhabitants of that Kingdom and therefore people outside of it.
Jesus prayer was the His Kingdom would come, and that once it came, His Fathers will would be done (in it HERE) as it was done in it there.
I suggest that that Kingdom has come, and it has members who do the will of God here as they would there, and it has been in existence since the wrapping up of the former age that had to pass away before the new age – the Kingdom Age – could be fully established.
So we are reading a prayer from Jesus to His own that includes things that were given and answered. He continues and says
3 Give us day by day our daily bread.
The imagery behind these words is one of reliance upon God to provide for our needs.
The idea hearkens back to some fantastic prose in Proverbs 30:8-9 which says
“Remove far from me vanity and lies: give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with food convenient for me: Lest I be full, and deny thee, and say, Who is the LORD? or lest I be poor, and steal, and take the name of my God in vain.”
Most people today are under the assumption that they are the ones who provide for themselves necessary provisions for life.
But the biblical directive is to realize that all of our needs and provisions are the result of Him and not ourselves – even if we have labored hard to amass a small fortune to provide what we think is temporal security, the wise humble woman or man does not lose sight of the fact that it truly is God who sustains us.
Of course some read this line as referring to God supplying us with the daily “Bread of Life” or “the living Word” which truly sustains us with eternal things and I cannot refute this view.
But it seems that Jesus was speaking to His apostles and trying to emphasize a peaceful sound reliance on God to provide their every need.
I think this is the better interpretation because of what Luke adds after the prayer, saying:
5 And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves;
6 For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him?
7 And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee.
8 I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth.
9 And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.
10 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.
11 If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?
12 Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?
13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?
We will get to these verses in a minute.
So, Jesus prayer, “Give us this day our daily bread” and then adds:
4 And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us.
Matthew account reads:
12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
And it appears that though the wording is different the meaning is the same.
Luke has “sins” (hamartias) and the interpretation that uses trespasses is a mistranslation that was popularized by the publication of the Church of England Prayer Book. In essence this phrase best means that “We ask forgiveness” for our debts to others (not literal debts as in money but in sins against them) which is in proportion to how we have also forgiven those in debt to us.
The edition of this line in Jesus prayer (or better yet, to how Jesus is teaching others to pray) is significant.
Why?
We remember what Jesus also said in His beatitudes:
Matthew 6:14-15 For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: 15 But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
I do not think there is any getting around this, but the best understanding of this seems to me to be that those who are His and have been justified and sanctified by faith WILL always forgive all, and those who aren’t won’t and not the idea that if I forgive I will be forgiven based on the work of forgiveness.
And then the rest of the Prayer (that we find in Luke 11 says)
“And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.”
A similar petition is offered by David in Psalm 141:4 where he writes
“Incline not my heart to any evil thing, to practise wicked works with men that work iniquity.”
However James 1:13 states plainly that “God tempts no man.” Because of this we must see both Jesus prayer and David’s psalm in the sense of God permitting – or we are faced with a serious contradiction.
So I read this as “Do not suffer us, or permit us, to be tempted to sin.” If this is the way to see it, then it seems that God has the ability to control us and or the temptations we experience and to save us from them or stop them from being presented.
The word temptation, however, can mean sometimes a “trial, affliction, anything that tests us.” If this is the meaning here, as it very well may be, then the import of the prayer is, “Do not afflict or try us.”
The Greek word translated to temptation is Pirasmos, and it can easily mean trial or difficulty.
I think the following line helps prove that this is the meaning as it says:
“But deliver us from evil.”
Don’t allow us to be tried but instead deliver us from evil.
Apparently, the best manuscripts include the article the, so it reads:
“deliver us from THE evil” who in that day and age was Satan, sort of like he is referred to as the evil one in other places in scripture.
Keep us from sore trials and deliver us from the power, snares, and temptations of the Evil.
Luke’s rendering of the prayer ends abruptly but as noted Matthews adds the flowery end:
“For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen.”
As I read this something in my soul said, “not real.” So I checked it out.
A number of commentators agree with Adam Clarke who writes about these words:
“The Doxology is placed in the margin of the Revised Version. It is wanting in the oldest and best Greek manuscripts. The earliest forms vary very much, some shorter, some longer than the one in the Authorized Version. The use of a doxology arose when this prayer began to be used as a liturgy to be recited or to be chanted in public worship. It was not an original part of the Model Prayer as given by Jesus.”
So, there you go. And this point, having been talking about prayer, Jesus enters in some illustrations that speak to prayer and our approach to it. So he says (at verse 5)
5 And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves; 6 For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him?
Automatically, we are presented with a picture of a person (representing ourselves) in need of something and going to ask a friend for it. A perfect picture of prayer.
And Jesus proceeds to show that, in order to obtain the blessing, it was necessary to persevere in asking for it. His design is solely to show the necessity of being persevering in prayer to God.
And in this light Jesus includes some very inconvenient imagery to illustrate his picture.
So, he has us come “at midnight” (when most people are asleep in bed) and make a request for our friend to “lend” us “three loaves.” (because we have a guest coming and have nothing to offer him)
(verse 7)
7 And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee.
Now it is easy to take this and think that Jesus is likening God to a man too busy to hear and respond to us.
But the point of the illustration is one of perseverance. Now why we need to persevere with God remains a mystery to me. I can’t quite come to a conclusion on that one. But again, the point of the illustration could not possibly be that God is too busy, its just that we need to persevere.
And so Jesus makes the point, saying:
8 I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his “importunity” he will rise and give him as many as he needeth.
Interestingly, the Latin Vulgate (a product of our Catholic friend) adds here
“and if he shall continue knocking.” Which is not in the Greek. But it seems like that would be the case.
Anyway, Jesus says that because of “his importunity” – his “troublesome perseverance; his continuing to disturb the man, and refusing to take no for an answer.
The word importunity denotes what we might see as an improper perseverance. In the illustration Jesus shows that the householder was influenced by it.
Rather than be disturbed and have his whole house troubled he would rise and give what was asked.
The best way I can interpret this illustration is that it suggests that God does not answer prayers immediately and that He often responds to prayers that are repeatedly offered.
On our end there seems to be something to tenacity. Again, why this is the case, I don’t know. And this is not the only time Jesus provides such an illustration.
In Luke 18:1-6 we will read:
1 And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint;
2 Saying, There was in a city a judge, which feared not God, neither regarded man:
3 And there was a widow in that city; and she came unto him, saying, Avenge me of mine adversary.
4 And he would not for a while: but afterward he said within himself, Though I fear not God, nor regard man;
5 Yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.
6 And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge saith.
Again, it seems that the “importunity” or persistence of the woman is what caused the Judge to grant her her wishes – and that being said Jesus continues at verse 9 in chapter 11 and says:
9 And I say unto you, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”
10 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.
And then some final illustrations beginning at verse 11:
11 If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?
12 Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? (And then Jesus summarizes a hopeful point, saying):
13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?
Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth.
3 Give us day by day our daily bread.
4 And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us.
And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.
And we are left with a fascinating revelation here:
That Jesus point seems to be revolving around a person asking and receiving the Holy Spirit in their lives, and not so much about money for a car payment or a new winter coat.
Think about that last passage in relation to all we have read today – as you launch out into the week.
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