All things that are reported to be said and done by God are for a miracle, for a wonder, are to be dreaded by mortals, and are even to be trembled at by the heavenly beings themselves. But at nothing does heaven so stand amazed, earth fear, and the whole creation dread, as at what you are today going to hear as we speak. The servant dares to call the Lord 'Father'; the guilty man names his Judge 'Begetter'; the earthly condition by its own voice adopts itself as a son; he who lost earthly things reckons himself an heir of the Godhead. Yet we dare, because there is no presumption in the one who speaks where there is authority in the one who commands. For he himself willed you to say this today, who taught us today so to pray.
And what wonder, if he then consecrated men into sons of God, when he gave and fitted himself to men as a Son? He then transferred the nature of flesh into the divine, when he brought down the Godhead to human nature. He then established man as coheir with himself in the heavenly places, when he rendered himself a partaker of earthly things: or what of love, of gift, of honor, could he deny to man, who took up all that was man's, even sin and death? Or how will he not have man in his prosperity, who made himself to be man's consort in adversity? O man, return to God, so loved by God; and to his glory give thy whole self, who for thy sake brought his whole self down to thy injury;
and call him thy Father, whom by so great a love thou provest, feelest, understandest to be thy Begetter. 'Our Father, who art in heaven.' Let no one marvel that, not yet born, he calls upon the Father. To God the things about to be born are born, the future is done. 'He made,' it says, 'the things that are to be.' Hence it is that in the womb John perceived his Author, and stands forth as a herald to his mother who was ignorant of life. Hence it is that Jacob is read to have wrestled before he was born, and began to triumph before he lived. Hence it is that they already belong to God who as yet do not belong to themselves, since you are chosen before the foundation of the world. 'Our Father, who art in heaven.' Not that he is not on earth, but that thou through this lineage mayest know thyself to be heavenly.
And if thou confessest thyself a son of God, live as a son of God, that in deed, life, and virtues thou mayest be able to answer to so great a Begetter. 'Hallowed be thy name.' Because thou art called a Christian from Christ, thou askest that the prerogative of so great a name be hallowed in thee, since the name of God, which through itself and holy is holy to itself, is either hallowed in us by our conduct, or by our conduct blasphemed among the Gentiles. 'Thy kingdom come.' He himself says: 'The kingdom of God is within you.' If it is within us, why do we pray that it come? It is in faith, it is in hope, it is in expectation; but we pray that it may now come. But let it come to us, not to him who ever reigns together with his Father, ever reigns in the Father, but let it come to us:
'Come, ye blessed of my Father, receive the kingdom which was prepared for you from the foundation of the world.' We say 'Thy kingdom come,' that God may so reign in us, that in us death may cease to reign, sin may cease to reign. 'Death reigned,' it says, 'from Adam unto Moses.' And elsewhere: 'Let not sin reign in your mortal body.' 'Thy will be done, as in heaven, so on earth.' Now on earth many things are done according to the will of the devil, according to the wickedness of the world, according to the will of the flesh.
But in heaven nothing is done except the Lord's will. We ask therefore that, the devil being destroyed, the world being made new, the body being changed, the empire of death being overthrown, the dominion of sin being abolished, in heaven and on earth, in God and in men, there may be one and the same will of God. 'Give us this day our daily bread.' After the heavenly kingdom, we are not bidden to ask for earthly bread, he himself forbidding it when he said: 'Be not solicitous what you shall eat, or what you shall drink.' But because he himself is the bread that came down from heaven, we ask and pray that we may receive that very bread, which daily, that is, continually, we take, unto eternity for the nourishment of body and mind.
'And forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.' In saying thus, O man, thou hast set the measure and the standard of pardon; and thou thyself hast given to thyself, who askest of the Lord only as much as thou thyself hast remitted to thy fellow servant. Forgive therefore the one who offends against thee altogether, if thou thyself wouldst owe nothing to the Lord for thine own offenses. In another's case forgive thyself, if thou thyself wouldst escape the avenging sentence. 'And lead us not into temptation.' God tempts no one, as it is written; but he is said to tempt when he abandons to the snares of temptation those who go on obstinately. Thus Adam ran into the snares of the tempter, while he forsook the precepts of his Creator. And by whom and from whom man is tempted he disclosed by saying thus: 'But deliver us from evil';
that is, from the devil, who is both the author and origin of all evil. The devil was by nature a heavenly being; now he is spiritual wickedness, older in age than the world, practiced by long use in harming, most skilled in the art of injuring. Hence he is called not so much evil, as Evil itself, from whom is everything that is evil. Hence it is that by his own strength man cannot be delivered, bound as he is with carnal chains. We must ask therefore that God deliver us from the devil, who lent Christ to the earth that he might conquer the devil. Let man cry, let him cry to God, let him cry: 'Deliver us from evil,' that from so great an evil, Christ alone conquering, we may be delivered. 'Our Father, who art in heaven.'
He himself, who is to be entreated by thee, has in very few words granted to thee the theme of prayer, the matter of asking, the norm of supplicating; that from this thou mayest take the sense of asking, mayest grasp the understanding of petitioning, mayest gather the measure of obtaining, and by a brief instruction mayest receive the most ample discipline of prayer; and at the same time, because for the judgment of love the King himself has performed the office of an advocate, that he might dictate the prayers to which he was himself to respond. All hesitation of meriting has been taken away, when he himself chose the one who is asked in the prayers. Fear has no place, where a son through his interpreter desires from the Father to obtain the things that are holy.