How Bold Is Your Prayer List?

I know. I don't think bold and prayer life are terms that belong together. But maybe that's a problem.

That's my conclusion after wrestling with part of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount recently.

Hodgepodge?

Matthew 7:1-12 isn't the easiest passage to understand. It seems at first like a series of unrelated thoughts with no apparent structure. Jesus bounces from the command not to judge, to the command to be discerning, to a section on prayer, to the Golden Rule.

"Here in 7: 1– 12 one is tempted to...