The Prayers of Jesus - Session 3 - Joining in Jesus' Prayer

Insights:

• When Christians pray "Your Kingdom come" they are praying for the completion of a kingdom which has already come with Jesus. (Oscar Cullmann)
  
• The term "bread" has multiple meanings. In antiquity "bread" was never taken as something merely material.
  
• The term "Father" is used with reference to God in the Old Testament 40 times; but in the New Testament 260 times. Jesus has radically changed the believer's view of God as "Father." (I. H. Marshall)
  
• The complete experience of God's will on earth occurs only when his kingdom comes to earth in its final form, causing an overthrow of all evil rule.
  
• The prayer is for our needs, not our greeds. (D. A. Carson)
  
• He only denounces his disciples' anxiety about the future, not responsible care for the future. (Michael Wilkins)
  
• We are taught to pray in the first person plural: "us," "we," and "our." The Lord's Prayer never leads to individualistic prayer. (Michael Wilkins)
  
• He wishes to be called Father rather than Lord, so that he may give us great confidence in seeking him and great help in beseeching him.
  
• When we know God as our Father, we understand that he cares about his will for our lives even more than we do. To place our lives in his hands means that he will always bring about what is best for us, even when it may mean sacrifice, or hardship, or difficult times. (Michael WIlkins)
  
• People who pray for the coming of the kingdom of God rightly pray that the kingdom of God might be established in them. (Origen, an early church father)

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The Prayers of Jesus - Session 2 - Our God Listens

Insights:

• If a wicked man will sometimes do good, even if from bad motives, how much more will God do right! -Leon Morris
  
• What Jesus has highlighted in his example and emphasized in his teaching about prayer is the goodness of the Father. -I. H. Marshall
  
• In prayer, we should draw ourselves to God and not try to pull God down to us.

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The Prayers of Jesus - Session 1 - Watch and Pray

Insights:

• It takes a life of prayer, a lifestyle of prayer, a lifetime of prayer to confront this kind of evil. (David Garland)
  
• A nameless woman anoints Jesus. A bystander carries his cross. A pagan centurion who was there to supervise his execution confesses that he is the son of God. A council member who condemned him to death obtains the body and buries it in his tomb. Women followers watch and go to anoint the body. Male disciples betray, take their rest, flee, and deny - because the flesh is weak, and they do not pray. (David Garland)
  
• My prayer life became a strategy session during which I informed God about what I intended to accomplish and then asked for blessing with added recommendations about how God could best meet my needs. (Darrell Back)
  
• I especially need your prayers because I am (like pilgrim in Bunyan) traveling across "a plain called Ease." Everything without and many things within are marvelously well. (C. S. Lewis)
  
• I am so busy now that if I did not spend two or three hours each day in prayer, I would not get through the day. (Martin Luther)
  
• We are going to face those times of testing when we least expect it. The only way for us to be prepared is to be prepared as Jesus was: in a lifetime, lifestyle of prayer with God. (David Garland)

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