This coming Sunday is the 17th Sunday in Lectionary Cycle C. Jesus presents a parable following the lesson on how to pray:

⁵ And he said to them, “Suppose one of you has a friend to whom he goes at midnight and says, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, ⁶ for a friend of mine has arrived at my house from a journey and I have nothing to offer him,’ ⁷ and he says in reply from within, ‘Do not bother me; the door has already been locked and my children and I are already in bed. I cannot get up to give you anything.’ ⁸ I tell you, if he does not get up to give him the loaves because of their friendship, he will get up to give him whatever he needs because of his persistence.

This parable, which is only found in Luke, is connected to the previous prayer by the words for “bread” (vv. 3, 5) and “give” (vv. 3, 7, 8). The setting is likely a small village where there are no shops. A household would bake its bread each morning. By the end of the day, the household’s supply is used. Now comes the unexpected call. At midnight the man must feed his friend, for hospitality is a sacred duty. So he goes to another friend for three loaves, i.e. three small loaves which would suffice for one man. But this second householder has shut his door and gone to bed with his children. Most families lived in a one-roomed house. The whole family would sleep on a raised platform at one end of such a room. A man in such a situation could not get up without disturbing the whole family. The friend raises no difficulty about giving the bread; the issue is the family already retired. (or perhaps just the bother of getting). 

This coming Sunday is the 17th Sunday in Lectionary Cycle C. We have been exploring some details about the Lord’s Prayer. One question that always arises in Bible studies is the meaning of the familiar form used in our liturgical settings where we are quite used to praying, “lead us not into temptation.” But note that the Lucan version in our gospel reading is “and do not subject us to the final test.” The underlying Greek word is peirasmos? Its normal meaning is “test” or “temptation” – not necessarily always with a religious connotation. In the LXX we find the ordinary senses (cf. 1 Sam. 17:39) However we also find the use of peirasmos with a religious use: divine testing, in relation to temptation to transgress God’s commands, and in regards to the human tempting of God. Here are some examples:

Human Temptation. Here peirasmos carries the sense of “that which tries to learn the nature or character of someone or something by submitting such to thorough and extensive testing,” namely, “examination, testing.” 

This coming Sunday is the 17th Sunday in Lectionary Cycle C. In yesterday’s post we considered the communal nature of the Lord’s Prayer and explored some linguistic elements. We will continue that trajectory a bit more today as we continue to look at the Matthean and Lukan presentations of this universal prayer.

Comparison of the two forms of the Lord’s Prayer reveals that the structure and content are basically the same, reflecting the original instruction of Jesus. They were shaped by different community traditions at a very early stage. Matthew’s text, an adaptation for liturgical use, has been used in worship down to our day; the briefer text of Luke, though less familiar, is probably closer to the original phrasing of Jesus. Both begin with Jesus’ distinctive address for God, “Father” (Hebrew: abbā – see note below on v.2), and pray first for the glorification of God’s name on earth and the full establishment of his kingdom. Then they turn to the disciples’ needs: God’s continual protection day by day and his sustaining support in the face of the “final test” at the end of time. In slightly different wording, both formulas relate God’s forgiveness of us to our forgiveness of others.

This coming Sunday is the 17th Sunday in Lectionary Cycle C. In yesterday’s post we looked at the immediate and broader context for the Lukan teaching about prayer – in this passage most widely noted as “the Lord’s Prayer.”

The context for the Lord’s Prayer in Luke and Matthew (6:5-15) are quite different. Matthew is writing for Jewish Christians that share a common heritage of prayer.  Thus Jesus simply begins: “But when you pray…” They seem to know how to pray and the importance of prayer, but they need further clarification about prayer – especially vis-à-vis the temple and synagogue exemplar and the pagans. In Luke, the audience, (including the disciples,) don’t know how to pray (at least as Jesus’ followers). The disciples (and Luke’s readers?) ask Jesus to teach them to pray – and this seems to be in distinction from John the Baptist’s disciples (v.1). This introduction also suggests that we are defined by our prayers.

This coming Sunday is the 17th Sunday in Lectionary Cycle C. The gospel offers Luke’s version of the “Lord’s Prayer” as well as a parable about how the paternal nature of God to provide the good things that are needed

With the geographical note, “in a certain place” Luke has separated this narrative from the immediate context of Chapter 10 (the conclusion of the mission of the 72, the parable of the Good Samaritan, and the encounter with Martha and Mary). Luke now presents three episodes concerned with prayer:

• the first (Luke 11:1–4) recounts Jesus teaching his disciples the Christian communal prayer, 
• the “Our Father”; the second (Luke 11:5–8), the importance of persistence in prayer; and
• the third (Luke 11:9–13), the effectiveness of prayer.