Is it possible to have authentic biblical community without community
prayer? How do you feel
about community prayer times?
Matthew 6:5-13 In the Lord’s Prayer Jesus taught in plural pronouns such as “we”, “our” “saints”, “brothers”, and “us”. Here Jesus modeled a prayer pattern that removes completely all first person pronoun. The challenge here is to pray in a unified voice. Prayer is to the Father, specifically "Our Father" therefore it is a prayer for the whole body for believers present. The chorus of intercessions also says: “…as we have forgiven our debtors…” There is a like-mindedness here that all in the assembly is willing and actively forgives. Praying this together encourages us walk the life of faith together, being forgiving. Along the same thought, old Hymns tend to use plural pronouns, while most modern Christian songs choose sentences with singular pronouns. Ours society has us individualistically minded, but let us not bring that thinking into our prayer lives.
The second linguistic detail to be aware of stems from is the contemporary English understanding of the word “you”. When Jesus starts His instruction on prayer to the crowd gathered in Matthew 6:5 He says “and when you pray…” Is Jesus addressing a crowd or just one person? I think Jesus means to say “and when you all pray.” In English, “you” addresses the second person singular or plural. The problem with this is that nearly every time a modern reader reads this "you" the assumption is for the singular, instructive. Jesus is instructing me, but moreover the original intention is that Jesus is addressing the disciples, the crowd gathered and by also the early church all together. So in the following verse (Matthew 6:6) Jesus gives the instruction for you to go into your private room and pray. Jesus is not discouraging public prayer or communal prayer He's telling us to go and pray privately because it show true motives, to check your heart. Rather than attention-getting on the street corner. In no way does he discourage coming together to pray.
My favorite contextual piece is the fact that believers in the early church had to receive the gospels together. The author probably knew this because of the general dates when the gospels were written. They didn't each have a Bible at home. The Word was planted in them as a community. A letter or epistle or gospel would arrive to a local church community and it would be read aloud usually in its entirety. Together they were learning the exact same lessons… only to them, “you” must have meant “you all”. The response to the public reading of the Word was communal. Whereas when we read the Scriptures now it’s often alone, the “you” mean “you alone” and therefore prayers tend to be “I’s” or “Me’s”. To understand the biblical instructions of how to pray we must re-emphasize what it means to pray “we” as a community prayer. "I" prayers aren't wrong either, I'm suggesting that it is too often we think prayer is about "I pray" when really "we pray" is also what is being taught
Application: Try and rephrase the Our Father to “My Father” by switching each pronoun to singular. What are the pro’s and cons. Do the same with an old hymn.
