Here is an expanded
paraphrase version of the Lord’s Prayer from a New Zealand Prayer Book.
The
Lord’s Prayer:
(inspired by Matthew 6: 9-13, Luke 11: 2-4)
Our creator God,
Ancient of Days,
Holy Mother of all
worlds and living souls:
Your arms, that
once flung galaxies of stars
like grains of
sand, are open wide,
and close enough to
carry each of us
like a father
cradles his child next to his heart.
May your sacred
name be praised!
May your realm
extend,
a commonwealth of
mercy, peace and justice.
Your love knits all
created nature into one whole.
Your will for us
always is love; and so we pray:
May your love be done on earth,
in time, as it is in eternity.
Give all of us each day the bread we need,
and hope to all who hunger for your life.
And as we share our bread along the way,
pardon us the times we've broken faith.
Forgive our lack of loyalty and love;
and move us quickly to forgiveness
when wrongs are done to us.
Do not abandon us in the time of hard
testing.
Save us from evil’s every incarnation,
From the powers that possess our spirits and
our structures.
Forever bind us to your liberating joy!
For you alone are God of grace and glory,
and Rock of our Redemption.
Let it be so, God, let it be so.
Amen.
~ from the New Zealand Prayer Book. http://anglicanprayerbook.org.nz/
