This week we begin with Question 41 of the New City Catechism, found in Part 3 (questions 36-52), which focuses on the Spirit, restoration, and growing in grace. Question 41: What is the Lord's Prayer? Answer: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. All

Question 40: What should we pray? Answer: The whole Word of God directs and inspires us in what we should pray, including the prayer Jesus himself taught us. The catechism makes reference to "the prayer Jesus himself taught us," commonly known as the Lord's Prayer. That prayer is found in Matthew 6:9-13 (see also Luke 11:2-4). We will take a closer look at the Lord's Prayer when we come to Question 41 next week, but for today we can benefit from taking a look at the teaching

Question 39: With what attitude should we pray? Answer: With love, perseverance, and gratefulness; in humble submission to God’s will, knowing that, for the sake of Christ, he always hears our prayers. Jesus provided for us the greatest example ever of what it means to pray “in humble submission to God’s will.” In the Garden of Gethsemane, knowing that the time for his torture and death was imminent, Jesus called out in prayer, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass

This week we begin with Question 38 of the New City Catechism, found in Part 3 (questions 36-52), which focuses on the Spirit, restoration, and growing in grace. Question 38: What is prayer? Answer: Prayer is pouring out our hearts to God in praise, petition, confession of sin, and thanksgiving. In his book Letters to Malcolm, Chiefly on Prayer, C.S. Lewis raises the question of what the point of prayer is if God already knows everything, and our prayers will neither inform h

Complete sovereignty over all is bound up with the very definition of who God is.

There are two wonderful truths in the phrase "Our Father in heaven" that should give us great confidence in prayer.

Jesus teaches us two major pitfalls to avoid when we pray, and in learning these two things we learn imporant truth about God.

The only way to pray to a God who is sovereign over us is to pray in submission to his will. Jesus modeled for us how to do that.

If we cannot inform God of anything or change his will with our prayers, then what is the point of prayer?

How far does God's sovereignty extend? Is it limited by human freedom? Or does God's sovereignty cancel our responsibility?