Bible Passage : Matthew‬ ‭6‬:‭9‬-‭13‬
“Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”

As a personal discipline, the first thing I do on January 1 each year is to spend an indispensable extended quiet time with God on a prayer walk or at a park.

There is nothing more precious than to look back on the year with thanksgiving to God – for what He has sovereignly given, taken or withheld from us – for our Godliness.

Likewise, there is nothing more assuring than to commit a new year to God.

We can never omnisciently know what the whole journey is but we can obediently know what the next step is under the Lord Jesus – who goes before us and with us for He promised to never leave or forsake us.

And there is no better prayer to beseech God with than the Disciples’ Prayer that Jesus taught his followers.

If there was one word to describe Jesus’ teaching, it would be “radical”!

Here are two radical truths from the first half of the Disciples’ Prayer, which I preached on at our first WatchNight service at Tengah.

1. A Radical Intimacy

Jesus invites us to approach the Almighty God – not with lofty terms such as Creator, Deliverer or Rock but in the most intimate or endearing way – as “Abba”, our Heavenly Father.

When my two kids were young, they would barge into my office or our bedroom completely unannounced.

No one else has that right or temerity to gatecrash my personal space like them! Why? Their privilege as my beloved children grants them the privilege to such unbridled and unhindered access.

Jesus – by his incarnational coming into our world and his finished work on the Cross – opens up this radical intimacy with God!

Therefore, why not make it our prayer to experience this radical intimacy with God ever more deeply and fully each year?

Why not set aside precious intentional time to bask in his presence, listen to his voice in his Word and yield every aspect of your life to him?

2. A Radical Repentance

Jesus next teaches us to pray for God’s name to be hallowed, for his kingdom to come & for his will to be done.

Jesus ushering in the “kingdom of heaven” signals the end of Satan’s wrongful evil rule and the start of God’s rightful reign through Christ as King over our world and lives.

We have to confess and repent of the endless wars we wage in our hearts, homes and lands.

Our petty wars are often or always due to our sinful inclination to hallow our inconsequential name, impose our puny kingdom or insist on our subjective wills.

Why not make it our prayer as we start the year to repent of making our name, kingdom and will the root cause of our warring hearts?

Instead, pray for God’s name, kingdom and will to be the new consuming passion of our redeemed hearts.

The gist of the first half of the Disciples’ prayer is Jesus’ call for us to “be serious about God”, who is now our Heavenly Father through Christ our Lord.

In fact, the phrase “heavenly Father” appears the most times in Matthew 5-7 than anywhere in the Bible.

If we pray this as followers of Jesus, all our temporal years, days and moments might be radically different unto God’s eternal glory. Amen.