The Lord's Prayer (It's Yours) - 4 Day Devotional With Matt MaherSample

Day 2 – Heaven on Earth

Sin corrupted the world, taking the perfect union and companionship with the Father into a perfect mess.

We live in a broken world and all of us can feel it. It’s heavy and a deep burden. Even those who don’t necessarily believe that “sin” is the cause of brokenness can still sense that something is wrong. We live in a time of war, displacement, abuse, disease, injustice and oppression.

Yet, so often we look at these issues as so big and beyond us that we push them aside. We can only focus on what we can control - so why depress our souls by looking at the deep turmoil of the world? So, we don’t pray for all the brokenness. After all, it would be a never-ending prayer.

But, during His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gives us a guide for prayer - known today as “The Lord’s Prayer”. In Matthew 6:9-10, he presents how we should pray for the world around us, “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

On earth as it is in heaven. What a POWERFUL prayer.

We know that heaven is a picture of healing, perfection, holiness, joy, celebration. Wouldn’t it be beautiful if God brought that picture back to earth? Wouldn’t it be beautiful if we could be part of that?

By praying this prayer, we present our requests to the Lord for two things. The first is for His reign and majesty to come back to earth. We are praying that His heavenly kingdom, of which we are citizens, will come to earth. We live in a world that the Enemy has deeply corrupted, so let us pray that the Lord continues to bring justice and righteousness and beauty back.

The second thing that we are praying for is God’s will - and what a difficult prayer that is to pray. Naturally, we are human beings that love to be in control. We love independence. We love making our own decisions. And we love to be in charge of things.

But we cannot fix brokenness - only the Healer can. So we have to pray for surrender to His will. He will never disappoint us, nor will His will fall short of perfection.

Reflect:

Listen to “The Lord’s Prayer (It’s Yours)” by Matt Maher and ask yourself these questions:

1. Do you often forget to pray for the world? If so, why?
2. What part of your life do you need to surrender to the Lord?
3. Do you truly believe that His will is better than yours (it’s okay if you aren’t there yet)? Why?

Take a moment to pray the first two verses of the Lord’s Prayer, pausing with any specific thoughts or needs...

“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven,” (Matthew 6:9-10).