Author: pleadinginprayer

As I finish going through Jesus’ Example Prayer, I want to spend one more week on the final phrase. “And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.”

Having grown up going to church, Christian school for K-12th grade and Bible College, I know it can be easy to forget how much sin we have been saved from. I have mostly known people who have tried to live according to the Bible. We haven’t committed what most people think of as bad sins. However, Jesus’ Example Prayer includes a request for help from sin. The fact that Jesus taught us to pray this, means we need help with the battle against sin.

My prayer is that we learn to follow Jesus’ example. He had the perfect plan in mind and knew what we would need.

God is so good.

Jesus Example Prayer ends with a plea for help with temptation. I find it sad in our society today – sometimes even in churches, that we don’t think we are wrong. When we read the Bible, we find out how wrong we are.

God gave us the Bible to read and learn the truth about who He is and who we are. The book of Romans gives us a good description for both. If you go to Romans 3 and begin by reading verses 9-12 you start to get the picture.

Jews and Greeks alike are all under sin,  just as it is written:
“There is no one righteous, not even one,
there is no one who understands,
there is no one who seeks God.
All have turned away,
together they have become worthless;
there is no one who shows kindness, not even one.”

Wow, that is clearly emphatic. We are all sinners. We are wrong. If you continue reading Romans 3, you will find more statements about how wrong we are. If God had stopped here with His Word, we would be in trouble. Thankfully, God made a way to take care of our wrong.

If you continue reading Romans 3 you will find out how this is possible. Verse 24 tells us that we “are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Jesus Christ. Verse 28 gives us the “how”. “For we consider that a person is declared righteous by faith apart from the works of the law.” By faith alone (not works), through Christ’s grace.

Friends, we all need help with temptation. Jesus knew this would be a problem for us, so He put this in His example prayer. Will you pray with me, that we would follow Jesus example?

God is so good.

The last phrase if Jesus’ Example Prayer talks about temptation. “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.” Now we know from James 1:13-14 that God will never tempt us. I think Jesus is reminding us that we need to ask for help from our heavenly Father to make sure we do not allow ourselves to fall into sin.

If you read the book of Romans in the Bible, you will find that we are prone to sin. Romans 3:10 tells us that “None are righteous, not even one.” We also know that Satan (the evil one) is “seeking whom he may devour (1 Peter 5:8).”

With those two factors in place, we need a lot of help to make correct decisions. The only way we can do that is to ask God for deliverance. He is ready and willing to aid us. Jesus would not have taught us to pray this unless God was going to answer with a resounding yes.

Left to ourselves we will be wrong again and again. With God’s help, we can make right choices.

God is so good.

When I first started writing about Jesus’ Example Prayer, I was struck by Warren Weirsbe’s observation of the plural pronouns in the prayer. Some concepts are easier to share than others. Forgiveness is a two way street. We often think in terms of one person doing wrong and the other being wronged. I think we need to realize that sometimes both sides of a wrong can be wrong. The Bible tells us that we are all sinners – just read Romans 3. If we are to properly give and receive forgiveness, we need the humility of knowing how much we have sinned against God. The beauty of this concept is that we are not alone – we all need a proper view. I think if we can remember that we are all sinners, we find asking and receiving forgiveness easier.

Forgiveness will always be a challenging concept, but God will help us understand how to work together to live Biblical forgiveness.

God is so good.

Jesus’ Example Prayer continues with “and forgive us our debts, as we ourselves have forgiven our debtors.”  I think we all know that we should forgive, but practically living that out is challenging. 

I remember reading Corrie ten Boom’s book, The Hiding Place when I was in high school.  The story gripped me; I couldn’t put it down.  I am still amazed by her stories of forgiveness. I recently read that during the 1975 premiere of the movie based on her story, someone threw a tear gas canister into the theater. The canister had the Nazi swastika symbol. An act that is hard to forgive. Corrie’s response follows Jesus’ example.

“What we have to do is love these people who hate us—love them, pray for them. These people are wounded people who have hate in their hearts. They need forgiveness. They need the Lord. That is the answer we must give.”

Corrie ten Boom

Wow!  God’s power at work.

We need to follow the examples God gives us through people like Corrie ten Boom and her family.  God provides the grace to forgive, no matter the sin.

God is so good.

As we study Jesus’ Example Prayer, we might get stuck on “daily bread” as asking only for physical needs. Our first thought of needs tends to be those physical needs. However, I wonder if we should include spiritual needs in that prayer.

Lydia Brownback in her book Joy: A Godly Woman’s Adornment talks about prayers in the Bible. She says that we tend to pray for physical needs because we know what we gain from them. She encourages us to pray Philippians 1:9-11.

“And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and all discernment, that you may approve the things that are excellent, that you may be sincere and without offense till the day of Christ, being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.”

Lydia reminds us of the great joy that comes from allowing God to provide spiritual needs. (pages 103-104)

Friends, as we pray we need to remember what is important. God cares about everything, but we need to be careful about getting stuck on asking for the wrong requests. We will gain so much more if we pray for our spiritual needs ahead of our physical needs.

God is so good.

Jesus’ Example Prayer continues with a simple request for our needs to be met. “Give us today our daily bread.”

Our study of God’s kingdom and His will should direct our focus regarding our needs. What we perceive as needs in our lives might be wants. As we take time to pray in the way Jesus’ taught, we will be better prepared to understand our needs. We will also be more aware of the sometimes ordinary and sometimes extra-ordinary ways God meets those needs.

God is so good.

Jesus’ example prayer reminds us of the order things should go in. It starts with a few reminders of Who should be first. “Your will be done” is one of those reminders. The only way we can put God first – to be willing to put our own will aside, is to pray and ask God to help us. We need to read and study His Word (the Bible). How can we know His will otherwise?

Friend, I pray that you seek Him today and every day. His way, His will is always best.