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Tag Archives: The Lord’s Prayer

Peter & John — Luke 22:39-46

11 Nov

Luke 22:39-46
39 Then, accompanied by the disciples, Jesus left the upstairs room and went as usual to the Mount of Olives. 40 There he told them, “Pray that you will not give in to temptation.”
41 He walked away, about a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed, 42 “Father, if you are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.” 43 Then an angel from heaven appeared and strengthened him. 44 He prayed more fervently, and he was in such agony of spirit that his sweat fell to the ground like great drops of blood.
45 At last he stood up again and returned to the disciples, only to find them asleep, exhausted from grief. 46 “Why are you sleeping?” he asked them. “Get up and pray, so that you will not give in to temptation.”

Dear God, I was listening to a sermon earlier today about prayer. The pastor was going through the Lord’s Prayer and how it is a model how to pray. Kind of an outline, if you will. It includes worship, a desire for your will, requests for provision and forgiveness, and an acknowledgment of your sovereignty. The part I just left out is the part about temptation. Jesus tells us to ask that you would keep us from temptation and deliver us from evil. It’s interesting that that is His encouragement here–“Pray that you will not give in to temptation.”

Now whenever I think of temptation, I usually think of the big things: lust, greed, lying to protect myself, etc. But I think the temptations Jesus is referring to here are much more insidious and lethal because they are silent killers. I think Jesus is referring to the temptation that he is feeling in the moment–that His will would supersede your will. Jesus didn’t want to go through what was in front of Him, but He knew He had to in order to accomplish your will.

So how am I tempted throughout the day? Sure, lust, greed, and those other things enter into the picture for me, but I also get tempted by lethargy. I get tempted by wanting to entertain myself and have self-indulgent respite. I want things to be about me. I want the world to bend to allowing for my comfort.

Father, help me to recognize the temptations for what they are and to die to myself in my pursuit of you. Jesus implores Peter, James, John and the others to pray against falling into temptation. And they faced all kinds including aggrandizement (who is the greatest?) and self-preservation (what would happen over the next few days). I am no different. So I don’t know how this works and how you keep me from temptation, but I pray that you will deliver me from evil and help me to live purely by your will.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 
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Posted by on November 11, 2018 in Luke, Peter and John

 

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Emails to God – Praying in Secret (Matthew 6:5-15)

29 Nov

5 “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 6 But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. 7 And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. 8 Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

9 “This, then, is how you should pray:

“‘Our Father in heaven,

hallowed be your name,

10 your kingdom come,

your will be done,

on earth as it is in heaven.

11 Give us today our daily bread.

12 And forgive us our debts,

as we also have forgiven our debtors.

13 And lead us not into temptation,

but deliver us from the evil one.’

14 For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.

Dear God, this verse always gives me pause when I consider the fact that I am publishing my prayers to you for others to see. My original motivation was to inspire others to take scripture and apply it to their daily lives. But does any pride sneak in here as I write these and publish them for others to see? Do I hope people are reading them and impressed with my spiritual insights? Do I hope they think more of me because of it? The answer to all three of these is yes. Yes, there is a part of me that gets some amount of pride through the responses of others. But I can honestly say that that is not my motivation for posting them. My motivation is to try to show other Christians that it is possible to take scripture and allow it to transform your life on an almost daily basis.

I actually stopped publishing these altogether for a while. In addition to publishing them online each day, I also have a few close friends, including my wife, to whom I email them. But earlier this year I stopped doing that. I wanted to spend some time writing to you and praying to you in complete private. I found that it wasn’t as much about not letting them see me pray as much as it was about feeling like I was changing what I was praying because I knew others were reading. I was letting the publishing impact the praying and that is where I cross the line.

Father, I want to pray to you with all earnestness, and then show others my failings and not my strengths. I want to be vulnerable and transparent in my life so that they will be able to better come to peace and complete submission to you. I also want to continue in my path of complete submission. Help me to decrease as you increase in my life. Help me to deny myself, take up my cross, and follow you. Help me to do it all for your glory’s sake.

 
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Posted by on November 29, 2011 in Matthew

 

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