Thoughts from Gary

In the last six articles we have looked briefly at the meanings of the different verses of The Lord’s Prayer.  This line differs from the rest of the prayer, except for the first line, in that it is not a beseeching from God, but recognition of praise to Him.   It is an acknowledgement praising Him and the eternal endlessness of His Kingdom.  It is actually a doxology, which means words that express glory to God, and is usually in the form of a song or hymn that is often sung in conclusion.  Another example would be of the well-known doxology  Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow  which is commonly known as  The Doxology .  Some theologians have argued their opinion that they do not believe that Jesus included this doxology when He taught His apostles this prayer and that it was added by scribes much later.  Luke does not include it in His recording of the Lord’s Prayer (Luke 11), but some have said the r...

Some may ask, “Why would I pray for protection from evil or the evil one, when I don’t believe there is such a thing as evil or the evil one?” (aka the devil or satan.)    To that person I would say, I am so sorry that you have become a product of Western secular education!    Ever since the “Age of Reason” took hold in the 18 th   century most highly educated people have denied the existence of evil, evil spirits or the devil as only a superstition carried over from an uneducated, primitive, superstitious past.    They may think of the devil as some old cartoon character that they have seen, where a good spirit and bad spirit whisper competing influences into the human’s ears.    Some might even remember laughing at comedian Flip Wilson’s humorous, “the devil made me do it” shtick, but to them the devil is just something to laugh about.       Their “reasoning” is that all we need to lead us to goodness is to be more reaso...