Take your Bibles with me and turn to Luke 11.

Two weeks ago, I started preaching to you about the Lord's prayer. Then we went to camp, and last week we were getting some much needed R and R and Adam went ahead and preached the next section of this chapter - but I want to go back and finish this message on the Lord's Prayer.

Let's go ahead and read this text.

[!bible] Luke 11:1-4 - KJV

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.

I told you last time I preached to you that this familiar text is Jesus' clearest teaching on prayer. It is a framework for how we should pray and that Jesus was telling us to pray for five things:

• Pray for God's glory
• Pray for God's rule
• Pray for God's provision
• Pray for God's forgiveness
• Pray for God's protection

Two weeks ago we talked about who we are to pray to: that we pray to "Our Father which art in heaven" - not a distant deity, but our loving heavenly Father who has infinite resources and sits on the throne of the universe.

And we covered the first two prayer requests Jesus taught us:

First, we should pray for God's glory - "Hallowed be thy name." This isn't just formal address, but a genuine request that God would work in such a way that the world would honor and revere Him. When God's glory becomes our highest priority, it changes everything - our goals, our responses to criticism, our generosity, and our service.

Second, we should pray for God's rule - "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." We're asking that the same perfect obedience that exists in heaven would come to earth, starting with our own lives. God's rule isn't a burden - it's a blessing that brings perfect justice, peace, and joy.

Today we're going to pick up where we left off and look at the final three requests Jesus taught us to pray: our daily needs, our forgiveness, and our protection from temptation. These last three requests flow naturally from the first two - when we get God's glory and God's rule right, we can pray about everything else from the proper perspective.

So let's have a word of prayer and we will get into these last three things Jesus taught us to pray for.

Heavenly Father, we want you to be glorified today through this message. May it be used to further your kingdom and for you to get glory in our life. We want you to rule us and to control our lives. And we pray this message will lead us into that. Give us today exactly what we need out of your word. Help us to understand your forgiveness. Help us to forgive others. Lead us where you want us to go. We ask this in Christ's name, Amen.

So we have three requests to look at this morning. We've already covered the first two, we have three to go.

The third request (and our first today) is:

1. Pray for God's provision

Verse 3 says:

Give us day by day our daily bread.

And listen - this is going to blow your mind, when Jesus said we should pray for bread - He meant we should pray for bread.

People have tried to spiritualize this. "It's talking about the Bible. It's talking about the Lord's supper. It's talking about Christ himself." I think that misses the point here. When Jesus told us to pray for bread, he meant that we should pray for bread.

God cares about the actual physical needs of our life. God cares that we have food in our bellies and a roof over our heads and that we aren't freezing to death. And here Jesus instructs us to pray for daily bread.

Now a couple of thoughts here:

First, we are told to pray for bread - not to pray for dessert.

In other words, God cares about our needs, not about our greeds. It is ok to pray for the things we truly need in life, it's probably not ok for us to pray for things we just want.

• It's ok to pray for a safe vehicle to transport your family - probably not ok to pray for a new Mercedes G Wagon.
• It's ok to pray for housing - probably not ok to pray for the biggest house in town.

Second, we are told to pray for daily bread - not ten years worth of bread.

In fact, it says "give us day by day our daily bread." God doesn't promise that He will make it so you never have to think about bread again. God wants us to trust Him for provision every day.

In the Old Testament, when God gave manna to the jews in the wilderness, He gave it to them every day (well, six days a week and they got a double portion for the sabbath.) They were not to go out and try to hoard the bread. They had to gather it every day. And every day, God provided. For forty years, God provided food every day for a million people in a place where food was scarce.

God wants to provide for us and God will provide for us, but we should look for God's provision day by day, not expect to have the next ten years buffered out.

Look, there is nothing wrong with saving money. The Bible teaches us in Proverbs that it is prudent to do so. But our ultimate trust should be on God's daily provision, not in our emergency fund and two years worth of savings.

God wants us to go to Him for our daily provision and He will provide for us.

Let's look at the next thing Jesus taught us to pray for.

• Pray for God's glory
• Pray for God's rule
• Pray for God's provision

4. Pray for God's Forgiveness

Look at verse 4:

And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us.

Just as we need daily provision, we need daily forgiveness. We mess up every day, and we need God's forgiveness every day.

One commentator said that as bread is the daily need of our body, forgiveness is the daily need of our soul.

Now, notice two things about this forgiveness we are to pray for:

First, Forgiveness is spoken of in terms of debt.

Jesus uses the language of debt here - "forgive everyone that is indebted to us." When we sin, we're not just breaking rules - we're accumulating debt. Every sin puts us deeper in the hole with God.

Think about it - if you owe someone money and can't pay, you're trapped. That debt hangs over you, affects your relationship, limits your freedom. That's what sin does to us spiritually. We owe God perfect obedience, but we keep falling short. The debt keeps growing, and we have no way to pay it off.

But when God forgives us, He's not just overlooking our failures - He's canceling our debt. He's wiping the slate clean. The bill that said "You owe God perfect righteousness" gets stamped "PAID IN FULL" - not because we earned it, but because Jesus paid it.

When Jesus was on the cross one of the things He said is "it is finished." "Totalastai" in the greek. It was the very word that would be used when a debt had been completely paid off.

We can have forgiveness for our sins because Jesus paid our debt.

But notice a second thing about forgiveness.

Second, Forgiven people are forgiving people.

Notice the connection Jesus makes: "forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us." This isn't a bargain with God - "I'll forgive others if you forgive me." This is a recognition of reality - people who truly understand how much they've been forgiven can't help but forgive others.

If God has canceled your massive debt of sin, how can you hold onto the much smaller debts others owe you? If God has forgiven you for rebelling against Him, lying to Him, ignoring Him, how can you refuse to forgive someone for hurting your feelings or disappointing you?

The person who struggles to forgive others reveals they don't really understand how much they themselves have been forgiven.

Jesus gave this parable of a man who owed his master something like $10,000,000 dollars. It was a debt he could never repay. In those days it was a prison sentence, probably not just for him but for his whole family. The man went and begged for forgiveness and amazingly, his master forgave the whole debt.

But then the man found someone who owed him money - something more like $100. And the man grabbed him by the neck and demanded he pay in full. When his master heard about him he decided "Do you know what? I changed my mind and threw him in prison."

The point of the parable is that when we are truly forgiven for our massive debt with God - we become forgiving people. This prayer is to be a daily reminder of that and Christians who pray this prayer should be some of the most forgiving people on earth.

Now, do you know what this prayer should do for us? Two things

First, when we pray daily "forgive us our sins" it should keep us from being self-righteous jerks.

Here's an expansion of those two points:

Now, do you know what this prayer should do for us? Two things:

First, when we pray daily "forgive us our sins" it should keep us from being self-righteous jerks.

Think about it - if you're starting every day acknowledging that you need God's forgiveness, it's pretty hard to spend the rest of that day looking down on other people.

Self-righteousness comes from forgetting how much we need grace. It comes from comparing ourselves to others instead of comparing ourselves to God's perfect standard. But when you pray "forgive us our sins" every morning, you're reminded that you're not better than anyone else - you're just a sinner saved by grace.

The person who daily prays for forgiveness can't maintain that attitude of "I can't believe they did that" or "I would never..." because they've just spent time with God acknowledging their own failures and shortcomings.

This prayer keeps us humble. It reminds us that we're all in the same boat - we're all debtors who need God's mercy.

Second, when we pray daily "as we forgive our debtors" it should make us forgiving and gracious people.

When forgiveness becomes part of your daily prayer life, it becomes part of your daily character. You can't pray this prayer honestly and then harbor grudges the rest of the day.

This prayer forces us to do inventory: "Who do I need to forgive? What resentments am I carrying? What bitterness am I holding onto?" And it reminds us that holding onto unforgiveness is inconsistent with being forgiven people.

Some of you have been carrying hurt for years. You replay the conversation, you rehearse what you should have said, you imagine getting even. But when you pray "as we forgive our debtors," God is saying "Let it go. I've forgiven you far worse. Free yourself by forgiving them."

This doesn't mean what they did was okay. It doesn't mean there are no consequences. It means you're releasing them from the debt they owe you and trusting God to handle the justice part.

So we've looked at four things Jesus told us to pray for so far:

• Pray for God's glory
• Pray for God's rule
• Pray for God's provision
• Pray for God's forgiveness

There is one more thing in this example prayer that Jesus gave us - one more prayer request. We are to...

5. Pray for God's Protection

Jesus said

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.

This might be the most misunderstood part of the Lord's Prayer. People think Jesus is saying God might lead us into temptation, so we need to ask Him not to. But that's not what this means at all.

James 1:13 tells us that God never tempts anyone to sin. God doesn't set traps for us or try to make us fail. So what is Jesus teaching us to pray for here?

When we pray for God to lead us not into temptation, we are acknowledging that He controls all of life.

God is sovereign over our circumstances, our schedules, our opportunities. He knows what situations we can handle and what situations would overwhelm us. We're asking Him to order our steps in such a way that we're not put in situations beyond our spiritual strength.

When we pray for God to lead us not into temptation, we are asking Him to not put us in situations we are not ready for.

Maybe you're struggling with anger - you're asking God not to put you in traffic jams when you're already running late. Maybe you're battling with pride - you're asking God not to give you success before you have the character to handle it. Maybe you're dealing with lustful thoughts - you're asking God to help you avoid situations that would fuel those temptations.

This isn't asking God to make life easy - it's asking God to make our path wise.

But here is the thing - it is hypocritical of us to pray for delivery from temptation, and then to purposely fill our minds with temptation.

You can't pray "lead us not into temptation" and then deliberately watch things that tempt you to lust. You can't ask God to protect you from greed and then spend your free time scrolling through social media looking at things you can't afford. You can't pray for protection from anger and then listen to talk radio that gets your blood boiling.

This prayer requires cooperation on our part. We're asking God to protect us, but we also need to be wise about what we expose ourselves to.

When we pray "but deliver us from evil" we are acknowledging God's power to protect us, not matter what situation He puts us in.

Even when we do face temptation - and we will - God has the power to deliver us. He can give us strength to resist, wisdom to flee, or grace to endure. We're not victims of our circumstances or slaves to our desires. We serve a God who is bigger than any temptation we might face.

This is our confidence: God will never allow us to be tempted beyond what we can bear, and He will always provide a way of escape (1 Corinthians 10:13). When we pray for His protection, we're expressing our dependence on His strength, not our own willpower.

Conclusion

So there you have it - Jesus' framework for prayer. Five requests that should shape how we approach our heavenly Father:

• Pray for God's glory
• Pray for God's rule
• Pray for God's provision
• Pray for God's forgiveness
• Pray for God's protection

Notice the order here - it's not accidental. We don't start with our problems and work our way up to God. We start with God and work our way down to our problems. When we get God's glory and God's rule settled in our hearts first, everything else falls into perspective.

Let me ask you - what do your prayers look like?

Do they sound like this: "God, fix my marriage, heal my body, give me money, help my kids, make my life easier"? Or do they sound like this: "God, be glorified in my life today. Rule in my heart. Provide what I need. Forgive my failures. Protect me from evil"?

Most of us have been praying backwards. We've been treating God like a cosmic vending machine instead of our sovereign Father. We've been more concerned about our comfort than His glory, more worried about our plans than His kingdom.

But when we pray this way - when we follow Jesus' pattern - it changes everything. It changes what we ask for, how we handle problems, what we worry about, and how we treat other people.

This isn't just a better way to pray - this is a better way to live. When these five priorities become the driving force in our lives, our marriages get better, our parenting improves, our work has meaning, and our problems have perspective.

So here's my challenge: For the next week, pray through these five requests every day. Start with God's glory and God's rule. Move to your daily needs and daily forgiveness. End with asking for His protection. Don't just recite the words - think about what you're asking for.

And watch what God does. Not just in your circumstances, but in your heart.

Let's pray together using this pattern right now.

[Lead in prayer using the five requests]