Tuesday, November 07, 2006

Taking the Lord's Name in Vain

It's not exactly the Lord's name, and I don't reckon I'd actually say it's "in vain", but my mind can't help but be drawn to the concept when I listen to some prayers.

This past Sunday, I counted the number of "Father"s in two different prayers, as in "Dear Father ... blah blah blah, and, Father, yada yada yada...".

One prayer had twenty-one "Father"s, and the other had twenty.

If I'm in a three-minute conversation with a friend, I most assuredly don't say that friend's name twenty times. To do so would seem, well, mocking, or something. Definitely odd.

So why do it when we pray?

Just curious. Comments are welcome.

2 comments:

T. said...

I think its a child thing. How many times do children come running up to a parent saying "daddy, daddy, daddy, daddy" until they are sure they have daddy's attention then say it one more time before making their request. Or the same thing with Mommy.
As we get older we learn to wait for a response rather than repeatedly calling a name. But with God sometimes we never learn.

evoljasen said...

These people had a meeting and decided to get together and do this just to bug you!

lol