The Lord's Prayer is a prayer I learned as a child, and prayed every now and then as an adult. It's one that is frequently brought out at funerals or special occasions, but honestly it was never really a big player in my regular daily life.
In recent years, I've made The Lord's Prayer part of my daily prayer time. I'd been struggling to pray regularly, and began looking for some new ways to approach prayer. I noticed that it was always in the rotation in The Book of Common Prayer, and as I began to create my own "set" of prayers, I included it so I could pray the words every day.
Praying The Lord's Prayer is a simple way to bring my heart into perfect alignment with the Lord's heart. It's one of the few explicit things He commanded His followers to do...and I'm amazed at how long I overlooked this small practice.
Prayer, to me, had always been about me bringing my requests to God. I usually have a pretty good long list of things I need Him to attend to, and I know He doesn't mind it - in fact He tells us to bring those requests to Him.
But I must say that in all my years, I never thought of prayer as "spiritual formation."
I never considered that by praying a prayer like The Lord's Prayer, I was helping to form my own soul into that of a mature Christ-follower. But I've found that these words have a lasting effect on me: my demands are fewer, my perspective is shifted, my heart is settled. Rather than rote words on repeat, they have become life and strength to my soul.
The prayer in the photo above is a printable I've made for you.
You can find it at rachelanneridge.com/henry when you pre-order my book, Walking With Henry there and sign up for the "Flash and Henry" email newsletter. There are a few other gifts for you there, such as a hoof-print bookplate and more printable prayers I know you'll enjoy.
You'll also be entered for a chance to win a pretty sweet gift package! All the information is on my website.
Is The Lord's Prayer something that is part of your daily life? Perhaps you could simply incorporate it into your prayer time, as a small act of obedience to Jesus' directive? You don't have to expect anything grand--there's no magic result--but I will tell you that you may find something stirring in your soul.
"Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done."
The Lord's Prayer reminds us that we are here for a greater purpose than we can imagine. We are here to participate in God's beautiful kingdom, and there is great joy in being part of His family here on this earth.
