And Lead Us, Not into Temptation

Good morning brothers and sisters in Christ. I pray that you are doing well this morning and are warm. I am grateful that you are here worshiping with us either online or in-person. You had the option to be somewhere else today but you choose to be with instead and I am honored to know this and truly thankful for your presence here. Today we continue our series on the Lord’s Prayer and we are in the 5th week of this 12 week Bedrock Series.

Just a quick refresher, and I invite you to say it with me, we have covered, “Our Father, who art in Heaven, Hallowed be Thy name, Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be Done, On Earth as it is in Heaven, Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

When you think about how much we have covered it is amazing. We have talked about it in Bible Study but How many of you have learned something about the Lord’s Prayer that you did not know before? How many of you are looking at this prayer just a little different now each time you say it?

Just a little refresher of what we have covered. When we pray this prayer we are admitting God to be parent of all of creation and as near as the air we breathe while being seated on the throne. We talked about hallowing God’s name in our actions and words and were introduced to the phrase, Ora et Labora, pray and work. Then we talked about Thy verses my and God’s Kingdom and Will verses our’s and how we are called to bridge the gap between earth and heaven. Last week we talked about forgiveness and our need to be forgiven and the need to forgive others and we are asking God to forgive us in the same way we forgive others. Remember, “You are Forgiven.”

This week we look at another great petition and maybe talk about a reason that we need to change the way we say this petition. I invite you to turn in your Bible to Matthew chapter 6 verses 9-13. I will be reading from the KJV again this week. Now hear the words of Christ recorded in the Gospel of Matthew.

Matthew 6:9–13 (KJV 1900)

After this manner therefore pray ye:

Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us, not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.

Our focus today will be on the first half of verse 13, “And Lead Us Not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” This is truly an interesting petition and a very meaningful one too. Let’s get into the discussion of this petition and don’t forget if you want to go deeper into this text you can come to Bible Study today at 4:30 pm as we discuss the 5th chapter.

The Universality of Temptation

In each of our petitions in this prayer we are admitting something and this is true with this one too. We claimed God as parent of all, we asked for daily bread for all, we admitted we all sin as we all need forgiveness. And now we make a statement that we all are tempted. Some of these temptations are daily while for others it happens at an infrequent rate.

I ask you this, how many of you have been tempted by something this week? Look around, but don’t judge because I can almost guarantee that you were tempted you just didn’t think about it in this moment. Plus the temptation could be something as simple as missing your devotional because you wanted to sleep late.

I would be willing to say there a number of you this morning that thought, man its cold outside, I’ll just sleep later and stream the service from the comfort of the house. Now, I am not saying those of you watching at home all did this, in fact most of you watching online have told me your reason for worshiping at home and I am thankful that you are still able to worship with us. But, it is always tempting to miss church because of family, I went last week, it’s cold, it’s raining, I’m tired,… the reasons/excuses go on and on.

Temptation is not limited to just you, we all face it. In fact if we turn to the Bible we find people being tempted throughout. If you look in Genesis at the creation story we find Eve being tempted by the serpent to partake in the forbidden fruit and then Adam taking a bite too. We find the Israelites being tempted by the idea of going back to Egypt would be better or other gods will save them. We find Jesus being tempted by the devil in the wilderness.

If Jesus, the Son of God is tempted then we will definitely be tempted. But the temptations will not just be our typical human temptations but will include the temptations that come from the great tempter. “Temptation is inevitable. But giving in to temptation is not. By God’s grace, we can follow God’s lead away from it.”

An Odd Petition

I would have to say that this is, as Adam Hamilton puts it, an odd petition. Isn’t it? Think about what the beginning of the petition is “Lead us not into temptation.” I must say I had never really thought about the sentence structure here and what we are saying. But it is like we are asking God to not lead us into temptation. I have struggled with this concept since September of last year (2021).

I really had not thought about it but Hamilton is correct when he says this petition is odd. I have never known God to lead humans into temptation. That is not the direction that God is leading us. God is calling us back to him and temptation is what comes between us and God.

What if we were to change the petition a little. Hamilton suggests, after many years of study and discussion, adding a comma after us. So it would read, “Lead us, not into temptation.” It changes what we are petitioning here when we add the comma. Now we are asking God to take the lead since we lead ourselves into temptation.

We put ourselves in situations that are tempting to do things we know are wrong. In his book Hamilton talks about a parishioner who was a recovering alcoholic and had fallen off her recovery a couple times. Hamilton said in one of their conversations he learned that she would go to a bar she would frequent when she was drinking just to order a coke. After a few times she of going she got comfortable again and would order one drink, then two before she was back to her old habits. She lead herself into that temptation again.

But, when we ask God to lead us, God will. Remember Jesus said, “come, follow me.” As disciples that is what our life is and should be, a life of follow Jesus and allowing him to lead us. Our petition for God to lead us, is admitting that we need God and God’s direction.

Lead Us,

But the petition doesn’t stop there. This petition is not just about the individual temptation but is about the corporate need for God to lead. This can be seen throughout history and society. We can look back at Germany during the Nazi regime and the anti-Semitism that existed. A government and its people were tempted by hatred and lies to remove a whole group of people. We can look back to slavery in the US. A whole country believe that kidnapping and owning people was ok. We could go on and on with situations where groups of people were tempted to do wrong. I love the closing line that Hamilton gives in his sermon starters, “This petition is not just for God to lead us as individuals, but for God to lead the church, delivering us from the evil of societal sin and helping us to actively oppose it in our day.

I can imagine a number of you have been tempted by this cake up here this morning. For some your mouth probably has been watering thinking about it. This cake looks good but we all know that it would not be good for us to eat. The temptation exists for us to eat it. The temptation is strong. Did God lead us to this temptation? No. But with God’s help we can resist the temptation to eat the whole cake. We can resist the temptation to take the cake home. I will say, a small piece isn’t bad but we tend to over do it don’t we.

Friends, as you leave allow God to lead knowing that you might or the tempter might lead you into temptation to do things you or we shouldn’t.