How to Make the Lord’s Prayer Actionable

If ever you’ve wished that someone could give you a step-by-step for how to pray, you’re not alone. Prayer feels often difficult because we don’t understand it, or we feel inept because we compare ourselves to others we think pray better than us, or we don’t really buy that God hears us, answers us, intervenes for us.

I find it noteworthy that even though Jesus’s disciples spent time actually seeing, talking with, eating with, and doing life with Jesus, they still felt intimated by prayer. In fact, Jesus taught the progression of the Lord’s Prayer multiple times, and once was in response to the disciples’ question, “Would you teach us a model prayer that we can pray, just as John did for his disciples?” (Luke 11:1 TPT).

As we typically recite the Lord’s Prayer per Matthew 6, let’s read these words together. However, let’s use a less-often memorized version to give us a fresh look. In The Passion Translation, the Lord’s Prayer reads like this:

Our Beloved Father, dwelling in the heavenly realms,
    may the glory of your name
    be the center on which our lives turn.

Manifest your kingdom realm,
    and cause your every purpose to be fulfilled on earth,
    just as it is in heaven.

We acknowledge you as our Provider
    of all we need each day.

Forgive us the wrongs we have done as we ourselves
    release forgiveness to those who have wronged us.

Rescue us every time we face tribulation
    and set us free from evil.
    For you are the King who rules
    with power and glory forever. Amen.

(vs. 9-13)

The posture of our hearts

Before we unpack how the Lord’s Prayer can be applied to our actual lives, let’s back up and read the verses that come immediately before as they describe the posture of our hearts as we pray. In order to best follow Jesus’ example, we are to approach God with both sincerity and humility. This is how Matthew explains it in verses 5-8 of chapter 6 (TPT):

Whenever you pray, be sincere and not like the pretenders who love the attention they receive while praying before others in the meetings and on street corners. Believe me, they’ve already received their reward. 

But whenever you pray, go into your innermost chamber and be alone with Father God, praying to him in secret. And your Father, who sees all you do, will reward you openly. 

When you pray, there is no need to repeat empty phrases, praying like the Gentiles do, for they expect God to hear them because of their many words. 

There is no need to imitate them, since your Father already knows what you need before you ask him.

The footnote on verse 6:6 explains that the “inner room” where we are encouraged to go to pray “can also be a metaphor for praying from the heart, from our innermost being.” What a comfort it is to know that God simply wants us to be ourselves as we pray! We can drop the pretending and comparing and excuse-making. He wants nothing more and nothing less than for us to come to Him sincerely and humbly.

This heart posture coincides with a missional mindset as we seek to let the things God is doing inside us ripple out beyond us in organic ways. When we practice authenticity in coming to God, it moves us to also be vulnerable and real with the people around us, inviting them to know us well enough to see the things God is working out in our lives in-process.

Keeping this foundation in mind, let’s take a closer look at the Lord’s prayer, verse-by-verse, to see how we can put Jesus’ prayer into action in our own lives.

Pause, praise, position

Our Beloved Father, dwelling in the heavenly realms,
    may the glory of your name
    be the center on which our lives turn.

v.9

First, we acknowledge who God is and that He is the One who gives meaning and purpose to our lives. We accept our lack and the One who supplies all that is truly needed. We pause to soak in the awe of the glorious and magnificent God who adores us. When we behold the splendor, the goodness, the faithfulness of our God, our automatic response is to turn towards Him. So as we pray, let’s invite this pause, this praise, this positioning of our hearts towards God.

Roots and ripples

Manifest your kingdom realm,
    and cause your every purpose to be fulfilled on earth,
    just as it is in heaven.

v. 10

“Manifest your kingdom realm,” according to the footnote, also means “come and begin your kingdom reign.” We’ve turned towards God, acknowledged Him as the foundation we seek to center us. Now we invite Him to come near to let the fullness of kingdom living take root in our hearts and ripple out from our lives. Only with Him within us are we empowered to lean into God’s purpose in our everyday moments, so we open this door, beckon Him in. This is what missional living in our neighborhood is all about—living with the mind of Christ—both proximate and available to our neighbors.

Release control

We acknowledge you as our Provider
    of all we need each day.

v. 11

Sometimes the things to worry about loom so large, they block God from our sight. When we acknowledge that He cares about all the things, big and small, that affect our lives, we find better perspective. A friend and fellow Hope*Writer, Jodi Rosser, likes to throw stones into the ocean (link to Jennie’s Shaping Stories) as she releases to God what is not hers to control. This is a powerful way to make this section of the Lord’s Prayer actionable.

Imitating forgiveness

Forgive us the wrongs we have done as we ourselves
    release forgiveness to those who have wronged us.

v. 12

Jesus models for us how to pray, but He also models for us how to forgive—and we cannot separate the two. As James Bryan Smith explains in Embracing the Love of God, “When Jesus told his disciples to pray ‘forgive us as we forgive,’ he was not giving them a prescription for forgiveness but a description of what those who have been forgiven do.” We don’t forgive so that God forgives us but as a result of being forgiven ourselves.

James Bryan Smith recapitulates it as such: “It is an undeniable fact that if I am not forgiving, I do not understand how much I have been forgiven.” The Lord’s Prayer encourages us to take the action of forgiving others the way God forgives us.

Petition and praise

Rescue us every time we face tribulation
    and set us free from evil.
    For you are the King who rules
    with power and glory forever. Amen.

v. 13

The Lord’s Prayer ends with our calling upon the power of the all-powerful God. This is a final surrender of the things that are hard, the things we can’t understand in the moment, the things that seek to pull our attention away from our King. When we focus on the trial or distraction, we begin to move towards them—and away from God. As we pray the Lord’s Prayer, we return again to the One we praise, set our gaze on Him.

The opening and closing verses of the Lord’s prayer endcap the prayer with this pause to acknowledge and praise God. Prayer is an act of worship. It’s an expression of our gratitude. It’s surrender. And it’s taking action in imitating the ways of God. Beginning and ending the Lord’s Prayer in this way emphasizes the importance of a rhythm of gratitude and praise.

God sees the desire of your heart in this very moment to know Him, and to know how to pray to Him. The Lord’s Prayer is a generous gift from a generous God who is ever drawing us closer to Himself. He wants to be known. He wants us to seek Him, to live into our purpose to praise His name through all we say and do, to find comfort in His presence, strength, and gentle guidance.

So as you pray the Lord’s Prayer, remember that these words, though they may be memorized, are an example of how to pray, not what to pray. Approach Him humbly, authentically as you. Pray from the truest part of your heart, not as you think others expect you to pray or how you’ve thought God requires you to pray. Pray remembering that you are loved and pursued and immeasurably treasured by the God all of heaven and earth.

Lord, I thank you that I don’t have to pretend to have it all together in order to pray. I don’t have to pick the right words, say them in the perfect order. Rather, you want me to practice turning my gaze towards You, acknowledging Who You are, and letting my gratitude overflow. In Your precious and holy name, Jesus, I pray. Amen.

P.S. Did you know The Uncommon Normal is also a podcast? Tune in on Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, or Spotify.

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