2. Pattern of Prayer

By Wolfgang Schneider

Jesus Teaching

When we link these two instructions of Jesus about prayer with each other, we can recognize from the overall view the pattern for Jesus’ prayer. This pattern consists of a total of 7 parts. The prayer pattern then is as follows:

We can recognize that Jesus is not as concerned with the exact wording of the prayer, which he would use or which his disciples are commanded to repeat. He gives a pattern, a structure, how prayer may be organized. It is like an outline which Jesus gives and by which we can organize our prayer.

In the book I mentioned earlier, Becoming a man of PRAYER, the author B. Beltz mentions this structure or pattern and he describes the individual components as follows:

  1. Our Father in heaven — Getting Started
  2. Hallowed be thy name — Getting Focused
  3. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. — Experiencing Divine intervention
  4. Give us this day our daily bread. — Praying for Provision
  5. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. — Experiencing Forgiveness
  6. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.. — Developing Spiritual Protection
  7. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen. — Final Issues

Prayer requires getting started, when we become conscious of who we are really dealing with and what this is all about. After that it is necessary that we focus our eyes and our attention on God, that we put all into the right focus. Then we will be ready to pray for certain matters, and again God is first and in the forefront of our minds for it is His Divine intervention, the carrying out of His will in the matters concerning us here on earth. Then follows a praying for our provision, that God would let us have what we need on a daily basis. Forgiveness has a very important part, the awareness and the necessity of our own forgiveness of sins and debt before God, and then in the same way our forgiveness of others on those same grounds. Then a praying for God’s protection and keeping from the evil one in temptations is also part of our prayer. And in closing, there is a recognition and confirmation of the greatness of God.

Explanations