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The Love Prayer of Jesus — This Will Ignite Your Heart!

Our greatest need is to be connected in loving relationships, but often we experience disconnects with people we were counting on.

Rejection. Anger. Judgment. Being overlooked. These are examples of relational ruptures that hurt our heart and misshape our soul — especially in childhood. Increasingly as we grow up we contribute to the damage. (Relationships are a two-way street.)

To help us heal and to pass on blessing to others Jesus gave us his own personal prayer. We call it the Lord’s Prayer or the Model Prayer.

It’s really the Love Prayer of Jesus.

In his prayer Jesus is helping us to follow his teaching to “love one another” (John 13:34-35, 15:12). (See last week’s devotional: “The Three Words of Jesus You Need Most” and our recent “Soul Talks” podcasts.)

But we’ve just about ruined it. We’ve turned it into a rote, religious prayer. We may think the words are quaint, but they’re tired, they don’t grab our attention and connect us with Holy Spirit.

For Jesus and his first disciples the Lord’s Prayer ignited their hearts and lifted them into the heavens. It can do the same for us!

For many years I’ve meditated on the Lord’s Prayer to nourish my soul and to spiritually infuse that nourishment into the people I’m interceding for.

I hope my fresh wording below helps you appreciate the Lord’s Prayer as a relational prayer, infused with a healthy and holy spiritual psychology. Jesus Christ, the Master Psychologist, is seeking to heal our relational ruptures and to re-shape our hearts to better love God, others, and ourselves.

The Love Prayer of Jesus (The Lord’s Prayer Paraphrased)

Our Father in the heavens, always near us and ready to help.
May your name be precious to us and bring us delight always.
May your kingdom of the heavens come rule over us
So your good, pleasing, and perfect will is accomplished in us and through us.
Provide for us the food and care we need today.
Forgive our sins as we forgive us those who sin against us.
Please hold us by the hand so we don’t fall down in trials or temptations
And are kept safe in your care from all evil.
All we want is to live in your kingdom, by your power, and for your glory.
Amen.

Ancient Meditations on the Lord’s Prayer

Down through the ages many great devotional masters have gone to Jesus’ prayer like a bee sucking nectar from a flower. I gleaned so much spiritual profit from preparing these free Soul Shepherding resources for you:

St Francis’ Prayer Inspired by the ‘Our Father’”

John Wesley’s Meditations on the Lord’s Prayer

This Week on Soul Talks: “Emotional Cut Offs Hurt.”

Bill and Kristi had an emotionally upsetting conversation. Each was tempted to “cut off” and avoid working through the mess, but they stayed with it. God helped them put into practice the Bible’s teaching to “be patient, bearing with one another in love.” It’s raw. It’s real. It’s grace. It works.

This is the last of 6 in the series “Repairing Torn Hearts and Relationships”

How is Soul Shepherding Blessing You?

“My eyes are glued to the screen as I read your devotionals. They water a bit when I receive these teachings because I love looking out for others souls… I am so blessed to share your writings with others!”
Laura in Alberta Canada

 

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