The Heart of Prayer

The question about prayer for the person of faith and for those who are struggling with their faith is not "What is prayer?" Not everyone, but many have an idea about that. The question is why do we pray; toward what end do we offer prayers to God? The first petition of the Lord's Prayer-"thy kin-dom come on earth as it is in heaven"-has become for me the foundational biblical assertion that answers the question of why. That petition points us to the reality of God's reign for creation in general and humankind in particular and has given us the model for all of our prayers and praying as we, too, attempt to embrace the vision of God's kin-dom on earth. Prayer becomes the means to an end. That end is the hoped-for reign of God on earth. This volume is an attempt to explore this claim through the eyes of the biblical story tellers who wanted to know in their own times what it meant to live toward the hope of God's sure reign in their lives. Such exploration then asks us, the readers, to connect the ancient story of faith to the stories we live and share in this part of the 21st century.