Well, good morning, church. We are returning once more to the Sermon on the Mount,
and specifically to the Lord's Prayer in Matthew chapter 6.
So why don't we pray as we come again to God's Word.
Father, as we come again to this prayer that Jesus taught us,
help us to not just learn what it means,
but help us to take it into our lives and make this prayer our own.
And in our prayerful communion with you,
we ask that your kingdom would come and your will would be done
in our lives, in our church, and in our world, on earth as in heaven.
Father, we pray this in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.
All right, well, today we're wrapping up our series on the Lord's Prayer
by looking at the sixth and last petition that Jesus gives us in verse 13,
which says,
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
Now, if you notice in the ESV foot… in the ESV anyway,
there's a footnote that says,
sometimes we include with this prayer,
because yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever. Amen.
Amen. We're not going to talk about that, but I think maybe Matt and I,
we haven't talked about this, but I think we'll write a pastor letter
that'll go out in the newsletter kind of talking about that last part.
So we won't discuss that this morning.
We'll talk about the newsletter.
So there's your plug to sign up for the newsletter and read it this week.
But we're going to look at this last petition,
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
Now, when you spend time meditating on the Lord's Prayer
and begin praying it for yourself,
you realize pretty quickly that the first half of the prayer is focused on God, right?
God's name and God's kingdom and God's will.
And then the second half you find is focused on our needs.
And the needs expressed in the Lord's Prayer
are really our most important and essential needs.
Two weeks ago, we looked at our need for provision.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And last week, we looked at our need for pardon.
Forgive us our debts.
And this week, we come to our need for spiritual protection and for power.
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
Now, I think this last petition is a little like smelling salts.
If we've grown sleepy or complacent in our spiritual life,
this last petition comes and it comes to wake us up.
It jolts us out of our spiritual stupor.
Why?
Because this last petition is about spiritual battle.
It's about the nitty-gritty of living life in the real world.
Now, what do we know about the world?
The world that we're in, it's a beautiful world, right?
It's a world that's loved by God and being redeemed by God.
Yes, but in this age, it is also a fallen world,
a world that's full of spiritual dangers.
J.I. Packer, the great British theologian commenting on this verse,
uses a powerful image.
He says, you know, if we fail to see this reality,
if we ignore or pretend that life is not a spiritual struggle,
then he says,
you're like a person walking blindfolded and with ears plugged
in the middle of a city street with traffic coming both ways.
So with this last petition here,
Jesus wants us to take the blindfold off
and be ready for the spiritual battle.
But it's not just, it's not just awareness that Jesus wants us to have.
He's also telling us the key for living in the midst of that battle.
And the key is prayer.
It's one thing to know you're in a struggle, right?
It's another thing to know how to navigate it.
You see, as living as part of God's kingdom,
living as part of God's kingdom with Jesus as your king,
that is the greatest adventure any life could ever have.
God's kingdom has dawned and is making all things new.
The church is an outpost of that kingdom.
It's an advanced foretaste of what's to come.
As we live in mercy, in truth, in forgiveness, in righteousness,
as we embrace Jesus as our king,
as we announce him with joy as who he truly is,
the world's rightful Lord,
this is the great adventure that we're in.
But like any great journey,
this one, above all, will have trials,
will have dangers,
will even have enemies.
So what do we do?
How do we proceed?
Well, there are two halves to this petition.
So in our time this morning,
we're just going to consider it in two simple points,
just looking at the first half and then the second half.
And in the first half,
we see that we need to pray for God
to lead us away from temptation.
So what is temptation?
Well, the Greek word can actually mean either a trial or a test,
or it can mean what we normally mean by it,
a temptation.
That is, that experience of an inner tug,
an inner pull,
to disobey God and God's word.
Listen to how the book of James describes
the dynamic of temptation in that second sense,
which I think is what Jesus means here.
James chapter 1 verses 14 and 15 says this.
James says,
each person is tempted
when he's lured and enticed by his own desire.
Then desire, when it has conceived,
gives birth to sin.
And sin, when it's fully grown,
brings forth death.
So temptation, James says,
is when we're lured or enticed by our own desire.
Now we have to be clear,
desire, of course,
isn't in itself a bad thing.
God created us as humans to have hearts
that are passionate and are full of desire.
He wants us to hunger and thirst for righteousness.
He made us to seek and desire his kingdom
and his glory.
And as those who know the new birth of the Holy Spirit,
we know what it's like to have those desires for God.
But notice that James says here,
temptation is when we're lured and enticed
by what he says our own desire.
That is a desire that's centered on self
and not on God.
A desire that's blind to God's glory
or to God's good law.
A desire that kind of wants to throw those things off
and rather than please God,
it just wants to satisfy ourselves.
And if you've been a Christian for any length of time,
you know exactly what James is describing.
Even though our sins have been forgiven
once and for all,
past, present, and future
through the atoning death of Christ,
even though we've been given new life
and new hearts and eternal hope
through his resurrection from the dead,
every Christian still battles with remaining sin
in their hearts.
The power of sin is still prevalent
and it will be throughout our earthly lives.
Okay, so what's the answer?
The stakes are high, right?
I mean, consider again this process
that James describes.
First, there's the temptation,
but then the temptation conceives
and gives birth to sin
and then sin becomes fully grown
and brings forth death.
At first, it's just a lingering thought
or a desire.
Then those thoughts or desires
give birth to concrete words and actions.
Then those actions become habits
and deeply ingrained patterns of life.
That's the process that James is describing, right?
I mean, no one ever wakes up one day
and just says out of the blue,
you know what I'm going to do?
I'm going to defraud people
of millions of dollars today
through fraudulent business practices.
I just decided.
It's a process that gets you there.
No one just wakes up one day
and says I'm going to be unfaithful to my spouse
or I'm going to get trapped
in alcohol and drug addiction
or I'm going to be judgmental and unforgiving.
That's not where it starts.
It starts in the seemingly small place,
in that small flash of self-centered desire
that we call temptation.
So what do we do?
Well, Jesus tells us to pray,
lead us not into temptation.
Now notice that this first half of this prayer
that Jesus gives us,
it's preemptive.
It's a prayer that is prayed
when you're not necessarily feeling the tug
and pull of selfish desire in the moment.
It's preemptive.
It's a prayer that's prayed
when you aren't in the heat of battle.
This is the prayer of wisdom.
It prayed at the beginning of the day
when you realize with clear eyes
that your fallen nature,
what the Bible calls the flesh,
will at times want to turn towards temptation.
It will want to give space
to the pool or lure of pleasing ourselves.
This is the prayer that says,
Father, I'm not as strong as I think I am.
And my greatest desire is to please You
and live in the joy of following
Your ways and Your words.
Your words to me are life.
Your laws are paths of increasing gladness.
You have made me for Yourself.
You made me for infinite joy in You.
But I know that remaining sin in me
will want to turn away.
It will want to drink from broken cisterns
that can't hold water.
So, Father, today,
lead me not into temptation.
Guide my steps.
Guide my thoughts.
Guide my day.
Keep me far from the lure
of self-centeredness.
I've been told that one of the paths
that leads to the top of Mount Katahdin in Maine,
which is the end of the Appalachian Trail,
I've been told that one of the paths
that leads to the top of that mountain
has one stretch that gets extremely narrow
called the Knife Edge Trail.
And it can be as narrow as about four feet
in some places.
And some of the drop-offs in some places
are as far as like 2,000 feet down.
Now, if you were waking up
on the morning of that hike
and you were at base camp or wherever,
your site,
if you were waking up on the morning of that hike,
before you got started
and you thought to say a little prayer,
what do you think it would be?
Father, keep me on the path, right?
Don't let me stumble.
Let my steps be steady and sturdy
and let me reach the summit.
Brothers and sisters,
there is a path we are on
in the Christian life
that leads to the most glorious
peak of all.
But there will be stretches of the trail
where the drop-offs are steep
and the danger will be great.
And in order to get to where God wants to take us,
it will at times be a very narrow path.
So we must pray every day,
Father, lead me not into temptation today.
And friends, here's the good news.
God has not left us alone on this journey.
He has given us the Holy Spirit
to dwell within us,
to be our comfort,
our guide,
our counselor.
God's own presence,
the third person of the Trinity,
the promise of the Father,
sent from heaven
by the ascended Jesus himself,
the one who descended at Pentecost
in wind and in fire,
the Holy Spirit,
Almighty God,
he is with us.
This prayer that Jesus instructs us to pray,
lead us not into temptation,
is a prayer that we might
keep in step
with the Holy Spirit,
that we might be led by Him
and His Word,
that we might let Him reorder
and redirect our desires
to all that is pleasing to God.
John Stott made this same observation
about this part of the Lord's Prayer.
As he kind of meditates
on this section of the prayer,
he notes that there's perhaps
a deep Trinitarian pattern
or logic
to these last three petitions
of the Lord's Prayer.
He writes
in his commentary
on the Sermon on the Mount,
he says,
it's through the Father's creation
and providence
that we receive our daily bread.
It is through the Son's atoning death
that we may be forgiven.
And it's through the Spirit's
indwelling power
that we're rescued from the evil one,
that we're led not into temptation.
So this prayer,
Lead Us,
is a prayer for God the Holy Spirit
to do His work in us
and to give us great confidence
and great courage
that we're not traversing
the knife's edge alone.
We have a guide who is sure
and He can be trusted
and He's given us His Word
to guide us every step of the way.
So friends,
this is a prayer
that we must pray every day.
Lead us not into temptation.
Holy Spirit,
cause my heart
to turn to You,
to heed Your leading,
to delight in what pleases You.
Keep me far from grieving You,
Holy Spirit.
Keep me far from temptation today.
And let me take up
those means of grace
whereby Your work increases
in my life.
Let me meditate on Your words.
Let me confess my sins.
Let me share my life
with fellow brothers and sisters
in Christ.
Let me receive their help.
Many of you can testify
that it's been through,
brothers and sisters,
that you've found
increasing freedom over sin.
Let me rejoice
in Your goodness today,
Spirit.
Let me use my gifts
to serve You and my neighbor.
forever.
So we pray this prayer
every day.
We know we aren't strong enough
to go through the battle alone.
And God gives us ample help
through His Holy Spirit.
But you know,
there will be days,
even days when it seems like
we've prayed this prayer,
even days when we feel like
we've felt the Holy Spirit's
deep assurance,
days when we're delighting
in God's goodness.
There will be days,
even like that,
when suddenly temptation comes.
We'll find ourselves
in the midst of trial.
And it doesn't mean
that God is unfaithful
because God is able
to use those moments
as times of strengthening,
times of growth.
But for these moments
in the battle,
we need the second half
of this petition
of the Lord's Prayer.
J.I. Packer again wrote,
you know,
when you're not conscious
of temptation,
pray,
lead us not into temptation.
When you are conscious of it,
pray,
deliver us from evil.
So this is the second point
that we'll consider.
In the midst
of temptation and trial,
we pray,
God,
deliver us from evil.
Notice how Jesus
doesn't mince words here.
He's very clear
that there is such a thing
as evil.
In fact,
the word evil
could be translated
the evil one,
meaning Satan.
Either way,
no matter how we render
the verse,
Jesus is quite unapologetic
that evil is real,
that it exists in us
as sinners,
in a world that's fallen,
and in the spiritual realm.
As Christians,
we will encounter that evil.
And it won't just be
kind of out there.
It will also be in here.
You know,
you can't escape
the fallenness
of the world,
right?
You can go to the most
remote location,
surround yourself
with only people
who think and act
exactly the same as you,
try to build a community
utterly away
from the evil
in the world,
and you will find
that it doesn't work
because evil is at work
in us
just as strongly.
So the answer
isn't to try
to just run away.
Now, of course,
we should certainly
flee temptation, right?
But if we're walking
the path of Jesus' kingdom,
if we're living
into our vocation
as His followers
to be salt and light
in the midst of the world,
if we're bearing witness
to Christ
in all of creation,
then we will encounter evil.
We will come face to face
with not just the brokenness
and corruption
outside of us,
but also inside of us.
So what do we do?
Well, we pray,
Father,
deliver us from evil.
Come to our rescue.
Now, you might be thinking,
wait, like, that's it?
Right?
In the face of evil,
we just sort of pray,
deliver us from evil, right?
I mean, it kind of sounds
a bit like underpowered,
doesn't it?
I mean, talk about, like,
bringing a squirt gun
into a forest fire, right?
Like, we're just going to
stand in the face of evil
in us, outside of us,
and just shoot up
a little prayer.
What good is a little prayer
going to do in the face
of the deep brokenness
of the world?
And yes, you know,
on the one hand,
praying this prayer
isn't a kind of magic mantra
that instantly makes things better.
That's not what real prayer is.
Real prayer isn't about
just sort of saying
the right thing
at the right time
so you can produce
a desired outcome.
It's not magic.
So what is prayer?
Prayer is communication
with God.
The triune God
has revealed Himself
as a speaking God.
And this God
has given to us humans
the gift of language.
Not just that we humans
might communicate
and commune with each other,
but also that we might
communicate and commune
with God Himself.
God has given us
this medium
whereby we can,
in our creaturely way,
commune intelligently,
actually, wholly
with our Creator.
So this prayer
in the face of evil,
deliver us,
is not just some sort of
vague intention
pushed out
into a cold universe,
right?
Hoping that the universe
will maybe right itself.
No.
We are praying
to the only one
who fully understands
the battle
that we are in.
You see,
friends,
evil is so much greater
than you or I
could understand
or experience.
Like,
we see our own
little trials
and temptations,
or perhaps we see
the brokenness
and suffering
of one part
of creation,
and at times
it's very great.
But the total impact
of sin and evil,
not just its personal dimension
or its communal dimension,
but also its cosmic dimension,
there's only one
who sees and understands
the full scope
of what sin and evil
really are
and really mean
and really cost.
You see,
the one who teaches us
this prayer
is the one
who actually entered
into the battle
with sin and evil
in that total scale.
He can tell us
to pray to His heavenly Father,
deliver us
from the evil one,
because His mission
was to come
and to win
this decisive battle.
Jesus Christ
was the only one
who went forth
into battle
with sin and evil
in its total cosmic scale.
And the cross
and the empty grave
are the battlefields
of that greater warfare.
You see,
at the cross,
sin and evil
did its worst.
It unleashed
its full assault
on God
in the person
of His Son.
And in what seemed
to be utter defeat
at the cross,
the greatest victory
was won,
because sin
was exhausted there,
and evil
was decisively
broken there.
And the grave
was emptied.
Christ rose victorious
over evil
and sin
and death.
And when we pray,
deliver us
from evil,
we aren't praying
a wish
or a hope,
but a certain reality.
Because Jesus Christ
took on flesh,
God came
in human flesh,
and conquered sin
and Satan
and the grave
for us
and for our freedom
so that the tyranny
of the evil one
could be broken.
Friends,
evil is ultimately
a defeated foe.
Satan is a conquered rebel.
Now,
we look at the world
and we look at our own hearts
and we see that
the enemies still rage.
The battle skirmishes
still go on,
but their time is short.
They still raise their fist
against the crucified
and risen King,
but His victory is sure.
deliver us
from evil.
Now,
we might pray this prayer
in the face
of a personal struggle
with sin or temptation.
We might pray this prayer
in the face
of broader patterns
of unrighteousness
and injustice
in the world.
We might pray this prayer
in the face
of spiritual conflict
with Satan's work
of lies and deception.
Whatever it might be,
we pray with confidence
that Jesus Christ
has triumphed.
From the moment we cry,
deliver us,
God's rescue operation
begins to apply itself
and carry on its good work.
help will be on the way
to cope and respond
with whatever form
of evil threatens us.
And His promise is sure.
One day,
death will be no more.
One day,
Jesus will return in glory
and every enemy
will be put under His feet.
The tyranny of evil
will be vanquished
once and for all
from God's good creation.
And God will be all in all.
So when we pray,
deliver us from the evil one,
we're praying that prayer
in the midst of deep
gospel hope
that the cause is not lost
but it is a certain victory.
And one day,
the earth will be full
of God's glory
like the waters cover the sea.
Let's pray together.
Jesus,
Lord,
King,
Redeemer,
we look to You
and we admit
that apart from You
we would be helpless
in the fight.
We are weak.
We are prone to wander.
We love ourselves
and our own pleasures
more than You.
We turn a blind eye
to evil,
even delighting in it.
We are sinners
and we deserve
nothing from You
but condemnation.
But You have conquered.
On our behalf,
You died
and You rose again.
And now for all
who experience
Your gifts of repentance
and faith,
You freely forgive our sins
and give us new hearts.
thank You for this indescribable grace
that flows from Your mercy
and Your love for us.
And so,
would we take up each day
this prayer
and pray,
lead us not into temptation.
Help us to live lives
that are wholly pleasing to You.
Give us a taste for holiness
that is unshakable.
Help us to love
more and more
the joy of obedience.
And would we also pray,
deliver us from evil,
trusting that Your victory
is complete
and that Your kingdom
is advancing
and the gates of hell
cannot stand against us.
Deliver us, Lord.
Come, Lord Jesus.
Amen.