In the previous study I mentioned that old saying, "To err is human, to forgive divine." But we aren't really meant to go on "erring". The question is how to break the cycle of sin in our lives.
Expo '88 was a great experience for those of us who lived in Brisbane. On a season ticket we could go many times without feeling obliged to stay all day. One of our family memories of Expo is the ball machine not far from one of the exits. Ball by ball they were lifted to the top and released to roll down along a track by various pre-determined choices - loops, chimes, spirals, a large dish... - all the way to the bottom. People would stand watching it in fascination. Was the sequence really repeated? How many different possibilities were there? Having seen it once, many people seemed drawn back to it - with its repetition and variety.
A marvellous bit of creative ingenuity! Perhaps its fascination came from its similarity to much of human life. A number of years ago I read an article about the hymns and how we really think them. One example was -
We can feel trapped in a cycle from which there seems to be no escape - not creative fulfilment, but the same negatives, the same sins, the same destructive forces. It is comforting to be able to say, "Forgive us..." - but is there no way out to a new way of life?
This is why we go on to pray, "And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil."
We tend to use our English word "temptation" in a very restricted way - enticement to do the wrong thing. The advertising industry works on the basis of "temptation" too, of course - not always, one would hope, in an "evil" sense!
In the language of the New Testament, however, the word includes that meaning, but has a much wider sense of "testing". So the Good News Bible translates it, "Do not bring us to hard testing..."
But whichever form of words we take, we are faced with significant questions as we seek to understand it clearly. On the one hand, does God tempt us? On the other, aren't we a bit hypocritical if we're afraid to have the genuineness of our Christian faith tested? We need to think about both these questions.
In James 1.13-15, it is clearly stated, "When tempted, no one should say, 'God is tempting me.' For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death" There is no doubt at all that these verses are about temptation to evil. But they don't rule out the possibility that God may test our faith, or that he would allow our faith to be tested.
When we pray for freedom from temptation, we aren't being hypocritical, but admitting our weakness. Temptation may well be for our good, but we shouldn't choose it ourselves or rush headlong into it.
Dr RA Torrey was a noted preacher of the late nineteenth to early twentieth century. One day a woman was telling him about her life and the circumstances that had led her into a particular sin. Then she said, "And what would you have done, sir, if you had been in my situation?" He answered, "My dear lady, I wouldn't have been in your situation."
Sometimes we are in situations where we needn't and shouldn't be at all. We could have chosen differently before we felt the pull of temptation. Our faith may be genuine enough, but not ready for that test yet.
Peter was writing about the rich blessings God keeps for his people in heaven He says, "In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith - of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire - may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed" (1 Peter 1.6,7).
One writer comments that "this petition seems to contradict life, which inevitably involves choices between good and evil, and so brings us into temptation. We cannot ask God to keep us from life's struggles and decisions. Jesus himself was tempted (Matthew 4.1-11) to the end of his life (26.36-46). The disciples likewise must face temptation, but they must not delight in it or be over-confident in it. They must ask God to spare them from temptation as far as possible, and to deliver them when they must face it."
That expresses well the heart of the matter - "they must not delight in it or be over-confident in it."
The second part of this petition is literally "deliver us from the evil." So the New International Version translates it, "but deliver us from the evil one." God doesn't tempt us to evil. But Satan takes advantage of life's trials and tries to seduce us from loyalty to God. As Peter puts it, "Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour" (1 Peter 5.8).
John reminds us again and again in his first letter that sin is foreign to a Christian's constitution. It should never be seen as just another fact of life which has to be accepted. Listen to this - "He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work. No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God's seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God" (1 John 3.8-9). In fact, he wrote his letter "so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defence - Jesus Christ, the Righteous One" (2.1).
This shouldn't lead us either to pride or to despair. We need to discover in practice of the victory that God has made possible for us in Christ.
Here is what Paul says, "So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall! No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it" (1 Corinthians 10.12-13).
So, in praying and in living, we shouldn't be confident in our infallibility - if we do, we will fail! Rather we are confident in the unfailing mercy and protection of our Lord. Our confidence is in him, in his work of redemption and in his keeping power.
So what are the points at which we fall when tempted, and fail our Lord? Are any of them situations where we should never have been in the first place? We need to be praying, not simply to be forgiven because we have fallen again, but to be kept from that situation of temptation.
If, however, the temptation is inherently and unavoidably part of our life, we need to pray to see and take the "way out" that Paul writes about. We know that "The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work." We don't have to fall under temptation, but we do need to depend on the grace of Christ and the Spirit of Christ to resist temptation and turn from it.
That is why our Lord taught us to pray, "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one."
