Proper 12C 2010
Sunday 25 July 2010
St. John’s Church in the Village
New York City
The Rev’d Lloyd Prator

In ancient times, when the bible was written, it was the custom of each well known rabbi to produce what we might call “signature prayers” prayers which so completely summed up the rabbis teaching that they became virtually identified with the rabbi.

Such a prayer is the Lord’s Prayer. There are many versions of the Lord ’s Prayer. This morning I plan to tell you a little about the prayer and, perhaps answer some questions you may have had for a long time about this, the most important prayer of Christianity.

First, in Protestantism, it is usually called the Lord’s Prayer. In Catholicism, it is usually called the Our Father, taking its title from the first two words of the prayer. There are two versions of the prayer in the Bible, one in Matthew and one in Luke, the version we just heard. The one we just heard is, you will notice, shorter than the one from Matthews’s gospel which is in fact the one which formed the basis for the standard version we use in most places.

There is a tradition that no Anglican Church service is ever complete without a recitation of the Lord’s Prayer.

The version of the Lord ’s Prayer in common use in England among Catholics and Protestants alike owes its acceptance to a rule made by Henry 8 in 1541. He directed that the translation made by William Tyndale’s translation of the New Testament should be used by all in every churches.

Our friends in the Roman Catholic Church have a shorter version of the prayer, they use simply the version which appears in the gospels, we have added to it, a sort of closing line of praise: For the Kingdom, the Power and the Glory are yours now and forever. Every now and again, you will find that short version of the prayer in Anglican use, usually when the Lord’s Prayer is in a penitential setting—like at the end of the Great Litany or at the ministry to the dying. But in most cases we include this concluding doxology to the prayer. Like a lot of other things, it comes from the Scottish Church, which was, in its own way, a treasure trove of liturgical wisdom upon which many have drawn over the centuries.

And, there are other variations in the prayers. Some pray “Our father which art in heaven” and others ask that their debts be forgiven rather than their trespasses. And, of course, the prayer has been translated into virtually every language around the world.

In 1970, some forty years ago, a contemporary translation of the Lord’s Prayer was offered to the Episcopal Church, and took its place there in the 1979 Prayer. We use the modern Lord’s Prayer virtually all the time, except by pastoral requests at funerals, weddings, or other occasions, like evensong when done in Elizabethan language.

Some people ask why we use this version of the prayer. There are three reasons. First, all the rest of our liturgy is in contemporary language. We have all the rest of our liturgy in modern language, why make this exception? It always seemed to me that we should have the Lord’s Prayer match rest of the language in liturgy. We use modern language because our religion takes as its main principal that God became human and lived just the life we live. So we decide to speak to God in just the language we use with each other. Thus, it is a consequence of the incarnation.

Second, music is an important part of our liturgy, especially when we the liturgy is sung, as it almost always is. the traditional chant associated with the Lord’s Prayer actually works better with the modern language than it does with the Elizabethan idiom. The music flows more naturally with fewer notes and easier meter. It is one of the simplest, sparest, leanest chants in the liturgy, and sometimes the simple things are the best.

Third, the modern Lord’s Prayer corrects some language problems present in the older versions. One question which always arises is about that petition, in Elizabethan language, Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. Well, in one way, no problem there: most of us would like to live an easy life in which all goes well. But do we really want to pray for this? After all, isn’t it true that in battles against sin and temptation is the place where we grow in strength and that untested virtue is pretty cheap material, indeed. Christ was tempted, not only in the wilderness but t every moment of his life—how then can we pray for deliverance from that thing which so shaped his life and ministry?

Right at the point when Jesus goes to the Garden, at the onset of is passion, he turns to his disciples and asks: Pray that you enter not into temptation. But they were going to do just that! One would retaliate against him, one would deny him, and all the others would wander away.

With some relief, I began to pray the Lords prayer, Save us from the time of trial in 1970. that line makes much more sense. The times of trial come, we can do nothing about them. I think that Jesus has something more nuanced here: he knows, as he will see in the Garden, that there will always be the temptation to drift away from faith. The times of trial count, they matter, they shape who we are, and what we are praying for is not that life will be slick and easy, but that it will continue to offer challenges, that it will continue to shape us and most of all, it will continue to matter.

I suppose in a way, I am a creature of tradition, but there are times when the new is an improvement over the old, not because it discards the old, but because it keeps the tradition alive and does not allow it to become ossified.