As Jesus brings his pattern for prayer to a close, he includes this petition: “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil” (Luke 11:4). It is important to rightly understand what is meant by the word “temptation” as it is used in this passage. We often think of temptation as an enticement to do wrong and that is its proper meaning much of the time. In this instance, however, the word temptation does not have that exact meaning.
In the first place, God never tempts any man to do evil. James, the Lord’s half-brother, testifies in his epistle to this truth. “Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man” (James 1:13; emphasis added). What then is meant by “lead us not into temptation”?
To understand it fully, we must look to the latter half of the sentence where the Lord adds “but deliver us from evil.” There must be some relationship between “temptation” and “evil” as well as “lead” and “deliver” for the prayer to make sense. The answer lies in the petitioner’s sense of his own sinful weakness and inclination to sin. The prayer crystallizes his own desire to avoid sin and, consequently, anything that would bring shame to his Lord and disrupt his fellowship with God.
On the one hand he prays that God’s leading would be such that it takes him far from any opportunity to sin. He trusts in the Father’s leading, leaving the future in his hands while embracing the Father’s purpose to keep him free from sin. But he also understands the bent of his own heart and his own weakness to overcome sin, so he prays “deliver me from evil.”
Only God can keep us from sin. Jeremiah, the prophet, captured mankind’s problem succinctly. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (Jeremiah 17:9). First of all, man’s heart is thoroughly sinful. In fact, God’s testimony concerning mankind immediately prior to the flood was this: “And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Genesis 6:5). Nothing has changed.
But not only is man’s heart desperately wicked, but we are told it is deceitful above all things. Man’s assessment of his own spiritual condition is untrustworthy. We can put it this way. Man does not see himself as God sees him and God’s is the only viewpoint that matters. So we are admonished to pray “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” We do not readily discern sin, we walk willingly into sin, and we cannot deliver ourselves from sin. Ultimately, sin is all that matters between my soul and the Savior.
The Psalmist learned that nothing compared with the favor of God for “thy lovingkindness is better than life” (Psalm 63:3). But fellowship with God requires “clean hands and a pure heart” (Psalm 24:4). The question we must each ask ourselves is “Do I value my relationship with God more than the pleasures of sin?”
From the Chaplain 