This article originally in Grace Magazine comments on Imagine and the Lord's Prayer both popular at the turn of the mil
It has been suggested that one reason Britain has such a commercially successful popular music business is that long ago the Methodists taught us to sing emotionally charged lyrics to catchy tunes. May be. There can be few reading these lines who have not been affected by the vast amount of popular music churned out in the twentieth century. Still writing in the old millennium it is difficult to be sure how long it will last but two particular songs have been popular recently. They encapsulate different worldviews. Here we see two universes next door to each other.
Materialistic humanism
I refer, on the one hand, to John Lennon’s 1970s song ‘Imagine’. Considered by many ‘the song of the millennium’ it has a pleasant lilting tune but with lyrics straight from the pit. The former Beatle, who died at the hand of an assassin, in 1980, asks us to imagine what for him would presumably be a perfect world.
We begin by imagining no heaven or hell. Curiously, we are to imagine people ‘living for today’ which must be the easiest thing in the world as that, sadly, is how most do live. In the remaining verses the reason for this stark materialistic approach is revealed. Lennon, like many in the latter half of the twentieth century, was sickened by the wars and violence so prevalent and so the idea of ‘no countries … nothing to kill or die for … no religion too’ seemed very attractive. Whether religion is responsible for most wars is debatable but it is an easy target when all one longs for is peace and quiet. He then suggests that somehow the elimination of possessions would help prevent greed and hunger, leading to ‘A brotherhood of man’. Lennon himself is aware that all this sounds hopelessly naïve and his one argument is that many people feel this way and that if he can persuade the listener he is right then that will be one step nearer to a world at one.
The reality is that Lennon’s philosophy did not keep him from being a violent and unpleasant man at times, a man who experienced and who caused pain and whose own fame contributed to his early death. His philosophy did not and cannot work because it is totally man centred and fails to take account of sin and death.
Heaven centred Christianity
In 1977, in the week that Elvis Presley died, I remember hearing an evangelist contrasting Elvis with Cliff Richard in terms of the peace that the latter had found in Christ. Many of us would not want to draw attention to Sir Cliff. In many ways his stance causes as much harm as good. However, his choice of words to sing at this time again presents us with a stark contrast, this time with the John Lennon philosophy found in ‘Imagine’. The main content of Cliff’s successful single is what is universally known as the Lord’s Prayer. It is the pattern for prayer laid down by the Lord himself in the Sermon on the Mount. In complete contrast to ‘Imagine’ it is a totally God centred lyric, addressed to God not man. It speaks positively of heaven and honouring God. It prays for the advance of his kingdom and the doing of his will before coming to earthly concerns. Far from being naïve or unrealistic it recognises the temptations or trials of faith that the believer is bound to face and malicious role of the devil and prays for deliverance.
It is no surprise that while little has been done to hold back the Lennon song great efforts have been made to silence Sir Cliff Richard. This year a court in Canada ruled against the use of the Lord’s Prayer in state schools as it could be spiritually harmful! It is not so long ago that Soviet Russia was trying to keep Bibles out of the hands of its people and there are still places today where Christian hymns must be sung sotto voce for fear of arrest.
The improvement
But what about us? It is easy enough, we trust, to see the defectiveness of ‘Imagine’ but are we making full use of the Lord’s Prayer? It was never intended to be recited but to give a memorisable pattern for our praying. Reciting it or singing it, however, does have the advantage of fixing it in our minds. I have sung it to perhaps half a dozen different tunes over the years, including an attractive calypso version that repeats ‘hallowed be thy name’ throughout. We have tried ‘auld lang syne’ with mixed results and usually sing it to ‘Crimond’. How ever you do it, have you learned it? Do your children know it? More, do you understand it? What ever we think of Cliff’s recording, let us at least go back to the prayer itself and learn something about prayer. It divides into a series of six requests. Because the language is very compact it is not immediately apparent what some of the requests are about. There are many catechisms and other helps available, however. They tell you this
- Hallowed be your name. In the first request we ask God to help us and others to glorify him in everything and to over-rule all things to that end.
- Your kingdom come. In the second, we pray that people will be brought to faith and kept in it and that Jesus will come again soon to bring in his kingdom.
- Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. In the third, we ask to know and obey his will as the angels - unquestioningly, willingly, diligently, immediately, constantly, wholeheartedly.
- Give us this day our daily bread. In the fourth, bread stands for all the necessaries of life and so we ask for what we and others need to sustain life.
- Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. In the fifth, we seek forgiveness for ourselves while committing ourselves to forgiving others.
- Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. In the final prayer we recognise that temptations will come but pray that God will lead us out of them without our giving in to sin and for deliverance from the Devil and all his designs.
Perhaps, in the providence of God, many will turn afresh to the Lord’s Prayer and consider it again. It can certainly be the best possible help to us in learning how to pray.
