The Lord’s Prayer begins with “Our Father.” Whoa! In Jesus’s day, you couldn’t begin a prayer more explosively than that. It’s been said that when Jesus told us to address God as “Our Father” that he was introducing a new way to approach God. Nope! The notion of God as “Father” had been deeply rooted in Israel’s story for fifteen hundred years. What Jesus was doing was calling for revolution, and that revolution would begin as a result of his ministry. The revolution is still underway, and Jesus’s invitation for us is to join it. And it all begins by saying the words, “Our Father.”

• What was your biggest takeaway from the teaching?
• How did this episode help you better understand the explosiveness of what Jesus was communicating when he called his followers to address God as “Our Father,” knowing the history of God as “Father” beginning with the Exodus?
• Knowing that this prayer begins with “Our Father,” how does the communal nature of this prayer affect how you will approach this prayer going forward?
• When you pray, do you take into consideration how the answering of your prayer could affect someone else’s life?
• Is it challenging for you to address God as “Father?” Why or why not?
• Where do you need to reformat or enhance your view of God as Father as a result of what you learned in this teaching?
• How can you begin walking out the truths of this teaching this week?

• The Lord and His Prayer by N.T. Wright 
• LORD, Teach Us by William H. Willimon & Stanley Hauerwas 
• The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard – Chapter 7 deals specifically with the Lord’s Prayer 

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