The Good and Dangerous Prayer

 A Seminar for Thinking People Who Are Ready for a National Change of Mind 

Organizing the Church According to "Our Father Who Art in Heaven"

Taught by John C. Rankin

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Seminar Outline

   The content of the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:9-13) is a structure through which to organize the church to be salt and light in society (Matthew 5:13-16). This prayer is good to those who seek the good, and dangerous to those who do not seek the good. If we lived by it, how simple, ordered and prosperous life would be.

   There are four comprehensive arenas addressed in the universality of the Lord’s Prayer:

1. Family – Our Father in heaven, holy is your Name.
2. Politics – Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven.
3. Economics – Give us today our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.
4. Spiritual Warfare – And do not bring us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

Line 1: Our Father in heaven, holy is your Name

1. The radical nature of the Fatherhood of God, the one true Creator. (Contrast with paganism, Islam and secular constructs).
2. The derivative nature of fatherhood/family.
3. The greatest social evil in human history – the chosen absence of the biological father; see http://www.teinet.net/pain_dares_not_speak.html.
4. The pain of Ishmael spread across the nations and ages.
5. The holy or sanctified (“set apart”) nature of God the Father: http://www.teinet.net/affirmation.html.
6. The call for us, as his image-bearers, to be sanctified.
7. The Name of Yahweh Elohim and the Name of Jesus.
8. The interpretive power of Only Genesis (examples of use in the context of debate over evolution at Columbia University: http://teinet.net/creation03.html and article on the Bible and the Qur’an: http://teinet.net/islam01.html); newly edited and republished book forthcoming (Only Genesis has a positive view of a] God’s nature, b] communication, c] human nature, d] human freedom, e] hard questions, f] human sexuality, g] science and the scientific method, h] verifiable history, i] covenantal law, j] unalienable rights.
9. The sanctifying power of the six pillars of biblical power (http://teinet.net/sixpower.html): a] the power to give, b] the power to live in the light, c] the power of informed choice, d] the power to love hard questions, e] the power to love enemies, f] the power to forgive.

Line 2: Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven

1. The kingdom of our heavenly Father versus big daddy human government (with Yahweh as King, consent of the governed in Samuel v. Saul).
2. The kingdom of God now, and as the antidote to tyranny.
3. The “dangerous” political nature of Matthew’s Gospel (Jesus. in the Face of His Enemies).
4. The power of the pre-partisan (www.prepartisan.us).
5. The six pillars of honest politics (http://teinet.net/sixhonest.html): a] the power to give, b] the power to live in the light, c] the power of informed choice, d] the power to love hard questions, e] the power to love enemies, f] the power to forgive.
6. The Sacred Assemblies for the Unborn (www.sacredassemblies.us).
7. Occam’s razor and simplified law (The Senate [Governor’s/President’s] Committee on Political Ideas; reducing legal codes at the state level to 19 pages [Connecticut as an example], and 15 pages at the federal level).

Line 3: Give us today our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.

1. The nature of economics as rooted in the Greek term oikonomos (“the rule of the household/family”).
2. The freedom of daily bread versus human certainty, and the cognate of entrepreneurial free market economies.
3. The abolition of usury, and of debt that is unrelated to sound and honest investment.
4. The Jubilee ethic of the Law of Moses, and the power for gaining national economic freedom.
5. TEI Burden Sharing (www.teiburdensharing.com); biblical alternative to health insurance.
6. The simple contract (http://teinet.net/simplecontract.html).

Line 4: And do not bring us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

1. The universality of the language of “temptation,” and its non-accusatory power in helping people face reality (The Ministers Affirmation on Marriage; see http://teinet.net/affirmation.html; The Ministers Affirmation on "The Pain That Dares Not Speak Its Name"; see http://www.teinet.net/pain_dares_not_speak.html).
2. The universal need for deliverance not just from an amorphous “evil,” but from “the evil one,” i.e., Satan.
3. Sorcery at the right hand of power: the all-defining spiritual war in the Bible, and its interface with politics and economics.
4. Jesus, in the face of his enemies (forthcoming book by the same title = a paradigm shift for overturning politics as usual).

Salt and Light

1. Revival in the church.
2. Awakening in the culture.
3. 1982 vision and call to ministry: theologically educated people in politics.

Summation

1. The Six Pillars of Biblical Power: An Affirmation (nationwide signatories).
2. The Six Pillars of Honest Politics: An Affirmation (nationwide signatories).
3. The Ministers Affirmation on Marriage (nationwide signatories).
4. The Ministers Affirmation on "The Pain That Dares Not Speak Its Name" (nationwide signatures).
5. The Pre-Partisan Caucus: biblically literate people running for office.
6. The Sacred Assemblies for the Unborn.

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