Page:The Lord's Prayer (Saphir).djvu/15

 LECTURE I.

PRAYER AS REVEALED IN CHRIST.

possess a twofold record of the model prayer which the Lord bequeathed as a precious legacy to His Church.

At the commencement of His ministry, in the Sermon on the Mount, after His warning against the false view of the heathen, who think they will be heard for their much speaking, Christ taught His disciples the seven petitions which combine the greatest brevity with exhaustive fulness; while in the invocation, "Our Father, which art in heaven," He revealed the basis and starting-point of all true and spiritual worship, the assurance of divine love and favour, which all worship which is of human invention, and prompted by the legal spirit, regards as the end to be merited and obtained.

Towards the end of His ministry, one of His disciples asked Him, "Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples." What gave occasion to the