The Lord and His Prayer Quotes

“Saying `our father' isn't just the boldness, the sheer cheek, of
walking into the presence of the living and almighty God and saying `Hi, Dad.' It is the boldness, the sheer total risk, of saying quietly `Please may I, too, be considered an apprentice son.' It means signing on for the Kingdom of God.”
― N.T. Wright, The Lord and His Prayer

“This prayer doesn't pretend that pain and hunger aren't real. Some religions say that; Jesus didn't. This prayer doesn't use the greatness and majesty of God to belittle the human plight. Some religions do that; Jesus didn't. This prayer starts by addressing God intimately and lovingly, as `Father' - and by bowing before his greatness and majesty. If you can hold those two together, you're already on the way to understanding what Christianity is all about.”
― N.T. Wright, The Lord and His Prayer

“When Jesus gave his disciples this prayer, he was giving them part of his own breath, his own life, his own prayer. The prayer is actually a distillation of his own sense of vocation, his own understanding of his Father's purposes. If we are truly to enter into it and make it our own, it can only be if we first understand how he set about living the Kingdom himself.”
― N.T. Wright, The Lord and His Prayer

“how much more ought we to cherish and marvel at the fact that for nearly two thousand years people have prayed this prayer. When you take these words on your lips you stand on hallowed ground.”
― N.T. Wright, The Lord and His Prayer

“It is true, then, that as soon as someone becomes a Christian, he or she can and must say `Our Father'; that is one of the marks of grace, one of the first signs of faith. But it will take full Christian maturity to understand, and resonate with, what those words really mean.”
― N.T. Wright, The Lord and His Prayer

“Most revolutions breed new tyrannies; not this one. This is the Father’s revolution. It comes through the suffering and death of the Son. That’s why, at the end of the Lord’s Prayer, we pray to be delivered from the great tribulation; which is, not surprisingly, what Jesus told his disciples to pray for in the garden. This revolution comes about through the Messiah, and his people, sharing and bearing the pain of the world, that the world may be healed.”
― N.T. Wright, The Lord and His Prayer

“Isaiah: there will be a highway in the wilderness; the valleys and mountains will be flattened out; the glory of yhwh shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together. Zion hears her watchmen shouting ‘Here is your God!’ Isaiah’s message holds together the majesty and gentleness of this god who comes in power and who comes to feed his flock like a shepherd, carrying the lambs, and gently leading the mother sheep. This is the kingdom-message Jesus lived by; this prophetic vision is the basis of the Lord’s Prayer.”
― N.T. Wright, The Lord and His Prayer