Hi,
According to Cambridge Dictionary, magic is defined as the "use of special powers to make things happen that would usually be impossible, such as in stories for children."
--> Link to Dictionary
magic
Moreover, "prayer" can be defined as a way of not only talking to God (in a relationship manner) but also a way of asking God for simple to impossible things. If this is the case, does this mean that "prayer" is a form of magic?
Prayer, in the proper sense, isn't magic since prayer isn't about using power to bend the world to one's own wishes and desires.
However, it is easy to fall into a pattern of treating prayer like magic; where prayer is treated as a supernatural power to cause things we want to happen to happen, and God becomes a kind of quasi-benevolent wish-granting genie. But from a thoroughly Christian perspective, this is a deeply errant view of prayer.
In the archetypal Christian prayer, the prayer Jesus Himself gives, provides us with an essentially Christian understanding of prayer.
"Our Father in heaven, Your name is holy;
Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven;"
The chief petition is not for what we want, but rather to align our hope with God's promise and work. We pray that God do what He has promised, to reign as king over all creation, bringing His redemptive power and work to the world. God's will being accomplished, because we hope and believe in His will, namely, all that He has done and promised to do.
"Give us this day our supersubstantial bread"
I have translated the word often translated as "daily" in the more accurate and literal "supersubstantial". There is some room here to be curious what Jesus means by "supersubstantial bread". But the most simplest reading would be that we pray for God's continued gift of our subsistance--our food, our on-going good, the life we have from God both bodily and spiritually. There is actually a good deal of scholarly discussion and debate on this part of the Lord's Prayer.
"And forgive us our debts as we forgive those who are indebted to us."
The word really does mean "debt" here; which is metaphorically also at times used to speak of unjust offenses--the incurring of a "debt" through an unjust action that needs to be amended. And that is what this means here: The cancelling of debts is a major aspect of the concept of justice in the Bible. In the Torah, the set of instructions given to the Jewish people on Mt. Sinai, is written about the importance of cancelling debts, as the canceling of debts means releasing the debt-ower into the freedom of no longer having the weight of that debt on them. That is what the Jubilee was intended for--every 50 years all debts were canceled, all slaves and other indentured servants were given their freedom, the slate is wiped clean for everyone.
Jesus, in the Gospel of Luke, quotes from the Prophet Isaiah of the time when God would send His Servant who would bring justice to the poor, grant sight to the blind, open wide the prison doors and set all captives free, to proclaim the great year of God's relief and restoration, the Jubilee of God.
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The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” - Luke 4:18-19
When God's kingdom comes, when God's will is done--our debts are canceled, and indeed all who are indebted to us have their debts canceled. God's redemptive work restores and reconciles--not just are we reconciled to God, we are reconciled with one another. God holds no record against us, and we hold no record against another. Forgiveness really means forgiveness, wrongs are righted and healing from those wounds begins as people love people--in the all-embracing love of God.
When God is king, debts are canceled, offenses are forgiven, and men are brothers and sisters to one another.
The release from debt is also freedom. No one is held captive, chains are broken, prison doors are opened, all is forgiven. Both the victim of injustice and the one who has brought injustice are reconciled in peace--as wrongs are righted, and forgiveness is found, and freedom is granted to both parties to heal and to be. That we are free to live out our full humanity with one another.
"Do not lead us to trial, rather deliver us from peril"
God, being a Shepherd to His people, leads His people. This petition means that we pray that in God's shepherding of us that we are kept in the safety of the green pastures; rather than to find ourselves in perilous times of testing and trial. The Old Testament history of Israel is a history of Israel going through periods of general good, and times of profound trouble--the most notable example of the latter being the Babylonian Exile.
We could see this as a request that we, individually, do not experience hardship; though I suspect an understanding here of God's shepherding love is meant: It is less a prayer about God keeping us from hardship and more prayer about us remaining committed to being God's people. That we not stray from the green of God's pastures, as it were.
And in some later manuscripts the Prayer ends with a doxology, "For Yours is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, unto the ages of ages"
-CryptoLutheran
