 |  |
A | 19-24. Treasure.
B | 25-34. Anxiety.
| a | The Gentiles seek.
b | Your heavenly Father knoweth.
c | Seek ye FIRST.
The first thing for us to notice is the fact that in the prayer which the Lord gave as a
model the believer "seeks first the kingdom of God and His righteousness", and has the
assurance that the Father knows his needs before he asks. Instead of elaborating the
opening words of the prayer, "Our Father", with subdivisions upon "Re-generation", etc.,
let us see that the real import is in the fact that the believer does not say "my", "me",
but prays, Hallowed be THY name, THY kingdom come, THY will be done.
In the corresponding portion (25-34) undue anxiety concerning food and drink and
clothing is forbidden; the Gentiles seek these things; instead of so doing, the Lord says:--
"Seek ye FIRST the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall
be added unto you."
The only prayer for temporal needs in the model given by the Lord is the clause,
"Give us this day our daily bread". The word which is translated "daily" is epiousios,
and apart from the one other occurrence in the parallel passage of Luke 11: 3 this word is
entirely unknown in either Biblical or Classical Greek--it seems to be a word invented
by the Spirit of God to express His purpose. Literally we might translate it "The bread
which cometh down upon us". We cannot believe it possible for any Jew in the days of
Christ to have missed the allusion to the Manna of the wilderness. It gives point to the
prayer to notice this. Pilgrims journeying through the wilderness are here. They have no
continuing city, but seek one to come. Their great prayer is for the coming of the
kingdom. For the rest, just the daily manna will suffice until the land of promise shall be
reached.
To have seen the Sermon on the Mount in the light of the wilderness with its teaching
concerning suffering and glory, endurance and crown, temptation and perfecting, would
have saved many a page of useless argument as to the meaning of "temptation" in this
prayer, or whether the basis of the Sermon be "law" or "grace". Future blessedness is
held out as a "reward" to those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, who seek first
the kingdom, who go on unto perfection.
Perhaps a few words upon the "evil eye" of verses 22-24 may be appreciated.
Edwin Hatch in his Essays in Biblical Greek under the word poneros=evil gives as a
secondary meaning "grudging", "niggard", and cites passages where "the grudging
eye", "the eye of the miser", "the niggard eye" are placed in antithesis to liberality.
The Hebrew word for evil (ra) is usually translated poneros, but is sometimes translated
baskanos. This use of poneros in the sense of "niggardly" or "grudging", especially in
connection with the idea of the "evil eye", throws a clear light upon a well-known
passage of the Sermon on the Mount, which if taken in its context will be seen to refer
not to goodness or badness in general, but specially to the use of money:--