Forgotten Art of Prayer — Eric Butterworth notes

Notes from reading Discover the Power Within You by Eric Butterworth...

Breaking down the Lord's Prayer (Matthew 6: 9-13) — Chapter 9: The Forgotten Art of Prayer

• Our Father

  • "God is my Father, I am His child. This declares our unity with God at the outset, which is man's greatest, perhaps his only, need."

  • "...direct[s] our attention to that in us which neither slumbers nor sleeps, that which "loves us with an everlasting love."

    • That is God within us. 24 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands.25 And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else.26 From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands.27 God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us.28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’[a] As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ [Acts 17:24-28 (NIV)]

• Who art in heaven

  • 20 Now when He was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, He answered them and said, “The kingdom of God does not come with observation; 21 nor will they say, ‘See here!’ or ‘See there!’ For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you.”

  • "We have within us every moment of our lives the great potency which is God. We have ignored it, shut our eyes and ears and understanding to its glorious possibilities. But it is ever there."

  • "The purpose of religion is to provide the climate and ecouragement as well as the techniques for stirring up and releasing "the gift of God" that is within."

    • I think that the purpose of religion has been adulterated over the centuries by tribalism, egoism of groups and self, binary thinking, etc. If God is Truth, why do we put so much focus on whether the individual churches or congregations we attend are the real truth? The truth cannot be found in man-made substances after all. Religions are just vehicles — no vehicle ever has any effect on your destination because your destination just is. No matter what vehicle to use there, just make sure you are following the map to get there. Where is the map? In your heart. In your Spirit. The Spirit of God in you will testify to you whether you are on the right path or not.

• Hallowed be Thy name

  • ""Hallowed" comes from the root word from which we get the words, "whole, hale, hearty, heal, healthy." This means, then, "wholeness and perfection is the nature of God."

  • "Jesus is here affirming the unity of the Spirit, the integration or wholeness of God."

  • "9 With it [our tongues] we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. 10 Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so. 11 Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening?" [James 3: 9-11]

    • "God cannot be life and at the same time send sickness. He cannot be love and at the same time do something in wrath or anger. He cannot be a protecting presence and at the same time will accidents. These things are completely unlike His nature, which is whole."

• Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven

  • "God's Kingdom is the perfect creation. Each individual is a perfect idea in God Mind, a divine possibility of infinite capacity."

  • "The will of God is the ceaseless longing of the Creator to express Himself and perfect Himself in the creation. There cannot be even the slightest implication of restriction or limitation in the will of God."

• Give us this day our daily bread

  • ""Thou aart our supply and the daily, perpetual manifestation of that supply." This is not asking God for supply, for that would be like a fish asking the ocean for water. It is simply an affirmation of the Truth that God is substance, and a claiming of one's inheritance."

  • "In all creation...man alone is sick, suffers, is unhappy, and knows want...because in his freedom man fails to claim his divine inheritance."

• Forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors

  • "Give and receive, cause and effect, forgive and you are forgiven...This does not ask God's forgiveness. It simply reminds us of the forgiving action of divine law, of infinite love."

• Leave us not in temptation but deliver us from evil

  • "Charles Fillmore [founder of Unity Church] adapted the modern and more accurate translation to the old prayer by changing "lead us not into" to the more correct "leave us not in." God would never lead us into temptation. Can light lead you into darkness? There can be no darkness in light at all. So, in this statement Jesus is simply affirming the Truth that the urge for the expression ofour potention is so great in us (that which we call the will of God), that it will never leave us comfortless in our time of trial....It will ever be the very power of help and healing and deliverance."

  • "...Jesus realized that temptation came, not from some outer power or influence, but from the "demon" of human consciousness, from selfishness, pride, ego, etc. ... We need not fight the evil person or...condition. The need is to "let your light shine." Light erases darkness, good is revealed, evil (so-called) disappears as darkness before the rising sun."

• For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever, Amen

  • not part of original prayer — added years later for liturgical purposes

  • "...in God is the goal, the means to achieve the goal, and the glory of its achievement."

  • "In ancient Hebrew, [Amen] means, "Verily, it is establish; it is true; this is the truth...It reaffirms in the most forceful possible way, "This is the truth....and it is now done.""

Let me know what you guys think in the comments below!