In the new testament there as far as I can remember only one prayer given as an example of what we should pray about. Other instants are about His prayers as on the cross, or about how and when to pray. When asked what to say in a prayer, he said. Bible Gateway passage: Matthew 6:9-13 - 1599 Geneva Bible Forgive an old man's choice of the Geneva Bible, it was the one I was raised with and am most comfortable with, strange words and all. It is the Cliff's notes version of living a good life and hopefully in a good society God is the boss, here and in the future. Thru Christ there is forgiveness and we all have hope of a good life here and in the next world. It is a promise. It is kind of hard to pay attention to the will of God if you are hungry, cold, etc, so we pray to God that we will have a good life with all our needs supplied here on Earth. If we are going to live in harmony, we have to get along, we all make mistakes, but if we concentrate on the mistakes and try to always win, we will be at a constant war with each other and life will be very unpleasant. It should be a give and take. The temptations in this life can dominate your life, and giving into them can destroy your life here and in the next world. We are not all created equal, don't all have the same gifts in life, and may wish things were different, but if all you do is concentrate on the fruits of the temptations, it is very difficult to get thru this world or into the next. I may well be an old fool and I am posting this in the religious section so probably no one will read it, but it would seem that we have strayed from the simple rules, as individuals and as a people and may well suffer the fates that Israel did and never forget that most of the nation just vanished and all of our knowledge of them is based on the few that survived and they were in the last wilderness for 2,000 years and the new nation, less than 80 years old, is under constant threat. In the whole chapter containing the Prayer, he gives us hope of the future but it is one of the few places I know of in the New Testament that places a condition on being saved, unlike the promise at the cross, he states that actions taken against your fellow man in this world and how you lead your life here, will have an impact on your future life, and what the dangers are of going thru the form of the Prayer and not actually believing in what it states. Not a Priest or Rabbi, don't know the Bible as well as I should, but trying my best to live the Lord's Prayer and the 10 Commandments hasn't been a huge disadvantage in life and feeling a sense of being at peace with the Lord is very comforting. The older I get, the more I wish a personal sense of being at peace with the Lord and the less comfort I get from any organized religion. YMMV
thing is they take God out of everything they can... and they wonder why things are the way they are... doesn't it say something about things will become as they were in the time of Noah??? kinda looks like were heading that way...
Some of what is going on is directly related to the falling away and the deception of some people by so called church's. If they are not teaching from the scripture then they are not providing the words of God. But this is all as it has been prophesied for the end times and people need to use discernment in choosing who they accept as teachers. We can choose our own teachers. Choose wisely so that you are not led astray.
Always thought the Bible was to be read as a whole and not cherry picked to bolster some preconceived goal. Much of what is now main stream religion is based on one or a few verses with little thought about context or relations to the rest of the Bible. Very profitable organizations have been developed over using the Bible to either enhance social control or fill the niche for "believers" who are seeking justification for the forgiveness for some of their actions in the past or ongoing. Now seem to be entering a period of time when God is being replaced by some social concept which is being defined by some group with an axe to grind. While it may seem to make sense, people usually ignore the fact that at the time a similar defense could of been made for Lenin, Mao, Polpet, and a whole list of others. Don't know about end times, I am afraid while it is not the good Christian thing, I tend to focus on what is happening to me and mine, the Christian fed to the lions in Rome could of cared less if it were the end times, it was without a doubt the end time for him. I do know that was respected as ones rights and beliefs as a Christian in the earlier part of my life are now being attacked by the woke as somehow being an attack on their rights. While it may be a negative concept to many of the modern generation, my grand fathers concept that free will made it possible for anyone to go to Hell in his own way seems to enrage some of our woke brothers and sisters. They no longer want tolerance, they instead demand justification and a complete surrender to their view point. Somehow actions that in the past have been questioned are not only correct, but special favors must be given to them as a repayment for societies mistakes in the past. While I am not as vocal in public about my beliefs as I have been in the past, my beliefs not only continue, but I find the attempts to limit them may instead be enhancing them.
The book of Psalms contains a whole library of prayers, any one of which could be adapted to a more modern context with minor editing. Lawsuits enforcing the 1st Amendment's establishment clause are not the cause of American society's descent into civil disorder...there are many other contributing factors to that process, other than public school sports coaches not being permitted to shanghai their pupils into pre game prayer sessions, or using the school's public address system to broadcast prayers at the students and assembled spectators. Schools are places of secular learning, not a place to be used as a pulpit for the purpose of religious instruction and indoctrination. Just because Jesus no longer enjoys privileged position in society, it doesn't mean that America is going to hell in a handbasket because of that fact (correlation does not of necessity imply causation), there are plenty of essentially secular societies in Europe (the Nordic nations for example), that enjoy excellent standards of living and community amity without the primacy of Jesus worship. As to 'The Days of Noah'...is there any sound, rational reason to accept that story, as anything more than being a 'just so story', to explain the early origins of the peoples who came to believe in יהוה ?
They who operate under Jesus' Lordship can receive the Holy Spirit and be taught of God to know how to pray. The most important part of any prayer is seeking God's will. Thy will be done, not my will be done.
That was the first prayer I could recite (and use). Later in life I turn often to the Serenity Prayer. But the Lord's Prayer I recite often too.
