BLOGGING THE LORD'S PRAYER: Lead Us Not into------ What?

And do not lead us into temptation,

But deliver us from the evil one (Matthew 6: 13; Luke 11: 4 )

This section of the Lord’s model prayer speaks a simple message:  Trouble is bad, but sin is worse.

If you get into trouble, if you fall into tribulation, if you are afflicted by the evil one then Jesus says, “It’s O.K.   Ask God for deliverance.”

Bad things will happen to you, but don’t panic.   God will bring you through.

That’s why John 16:33 ends with Jesus’ reassurance that In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.(John 16: 33)

So, even though you know that evil times are inevitable, you can “Keep calm and carry on.”

That’s why John 16: 33 begins with Jesus explaining that These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace.

 Evil situations are bad, but what should you most isn’t evil; it’s TEMPTATION. 

Each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death. (James 1: 14, 15)

So pray: Lord, do not lead us into temptation .

Jesus basically said, “You don’t even want to go there---- at all,” and Jesus knew a thing or two about how being led into temptation.

After He was baptized by John, then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.  (Matthew 4:1)

God Himself didn’t personally do the tempting.  Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God” (James 1: 13); but God did lead Jesus into the place where He would be tempted.  Tempted to sin.

For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin (Hebrews 4: 15)

Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him.(James 1: 12)

Jesus did not fall to the temptation.  But He felt it.

Jesus experienced temptation, and He experienced suffering at the hands of evil one(s).

Every day of His life down here on Earth, Jesus  suffered with the deprivation of Heaven.  Jesus was hated, misunderstood, and targeted for attack essentially from the day of His conception.  Every day Jesus lived with the heart-wrenching knowledge that He would be betrayed and denied by the men He trusted most and abandoned by all of  His best friends.  Jesus knew that His Earthly life would be ended by injustice, torture, and execution in the most painful manner devised by the collective intelligence of the most advanced civilization in the Western world.

Of course Jesus didn’t enjoy or want any of that suffering.   In the Garden of Gethsemane, He sweated blood from the stress (Luke 22: 44) and  fell on His face, and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.” (Matthew 26: 39)

Yet, despite His suffering, Jesus did not teach His disciples to pray for God to let them avoid evil/ the evil one.  In comparison, Jesus regarded temptation, the enticement to disobey God, as so bad that His disciples we should ask God to keep them away from it all together.

Being tempted hurt Jesus more than being mistreated.

The whip hurt.  The punches, the nail, the spear to His side, they pained Him and/ or left scars.   But it was only when the weight of all sin fell on Him that Jesus spoke with despair---- and gave up.

 “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” … And Jesus cried out again with a loud voice, and yielded up His spirit.  (Matthew 27: 46, 50)

For Jesus, sin was worse than suffering.

And so Jesus taught His disciples (then and now) to ask God to deliver us from the evil one; but please, please whatever you do, Lord, do not lead us into temptation.

Which is exactly the opposite of how we actually pray.

Except when we recite the Lord’s Prayer, most Christian prayers sound more like:  Deliver us from temptation and do not lead us into evil.

We excuse our continual sin and we relish our temptations.

"Don’t judge me." 

"Everyone has a right to..."

"I should be able to choose for myself."

"Blah blah blah blah---- grace."

(Romans 6:15 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? Certainly NOT!)

I’ve actually heard people pray, “And if I should do anything that displeases you this week, then, Lord forgive me.”  (They said this out loud, and they weren’t on any heavy medication at the time.)

We want to yield to every temptation and then get God to deliver us.

But we don’t want to even touch tribulation.  We don’t want to endure any suffering.  We don’t want to experience any pain.  In fact, popular Christianity claims ease and exemption from all unpleasantries as the birthright of every true child of the King.

We want God to keep us away from pain and get us out of sin.

Generally, we Christians are more worried about suffering than about sinning.  And that is the opposite of what Jesus taught.

Jesus said: In the world you WILL have tribulation. 

In the midst of trouble, Jesus tells us that we can still have peace.  We can claim victory and deliverance even while we are being afflicted. 

We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed—

Surrounded and affected by a world of suffering we can be of good cheer, because Jesus has already overcome the world and we are always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. (2 Corinthians 4: 8-10)

So, though we wish that this cup could pass from us, nevertheless we trust that God will deliver us from evil.  

Popular Christianity portrays suffering as avoidable (with enough faith) and sin as inevitable.  But that’s not what the Bible says.

Though our flesh longs to yield to temptation, we who have received grace should not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin (Romans 6: 13).

Though there’s a part of us that wants to go there and ask for forgiveness later, we are taught to flee also youthful lusts; but pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.  (2 Timothy 2:22)

I know what everyone says.  I know how everyone thinks.  As Christians, our goal is to transcend our thinking and come to think like Jesus.

Well, Jesus thought that sin was worse than suffering.

And so, we deliberately and obediently pray: 

And do not lead us into temptation,

But deliver us from the evil one. 

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church in Montgomery, Alabama, executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO) and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

To hear sermons, read devotions, and learn more about the ministry at Hall Memorial CME Church, visit www.hallmemorialcme.blogspot.com .

You can read more on Pastor Graves's personal blog at www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com  .

If this message helps or touches you, please help support this ministry. Send a donation of any amount by check or money order.

Mail all contributions to :

Hall Memorial CME Church

541 Seibles Road

Montgomery, AL 36116

THE OTHER HALF OF CRAZY

Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members?

You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. (James 4: 1, 2)

The layman’s definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.   But, that’s only half of the crazy.

The crazier half is not realizing that the reason you fail is because of the things you continue to do over and over.

James, the brother of the Lord, wrote a plea to the early church.  In the A. T. Graves paraphrased version James said: “Where da’ crap do you think all this drama comes from?  Don’t you see that you’re the source of all your confusion?   You want stuff, and the way you try to get it is the very reason why you don’t have it.  But you keep trying to get it the same way.”

James goes on to point out that some of the stuff they want is stuff they shouldn’t have---- but that’s a topic for another post.

If your life is a continuing cycle of 4 months of ballin’ followed by 2 months of bankruptcy and begging------ where da’ crap  do you think your bankruptcy comes from?  It’s not because of haters, or the government, or your baby’s daddy/ mama ‘nem.  It’s because as soon as you get a little money, you spend it foolishly.   Stop the foolishness (STOP not pause and restart) and the cycle of desperation will magically go away.

If you keep falling in and out of toxic, dead-end, destructive relationships------ who da’ crap do you think keeps bringing these people into your life?  The neighborhood doesn’t go out with them.  Your “haters” don’t give them your number and home address.  And all men/ all women aren’t like that----- or you wouldn’t have so many couples to envy.  Baby, it’s you.  If you stop selecting your romantic interests based on the worst possible set of standards then you wouldn’t keep ending up with the worst possible kinds of people.

If your church is in continual decline----- who?  Who in crap do you think is killing the ministry?  The gates of Hell can’t prevail against the church, but the Hell on the inside will kill it like cancer.  Stop blaming the media, the bishops, the big church up the road, and the devil.  It is the wars and fights we perpetuate among ourselves that kill churches.  It is our own desires for power and control no matter what the cost to the young, the weak, and the spiritually vulnerable. 

We fail because we keep doing the things that cause failure and we not only expect a different result, we haven’t even accepted that our current results are our fault.

Fortunately, James articulates the solution as well as the problem.

James 4: 7-12.

·         Submit to God.

·         Resist the devil

·         Draw near to God  

·         Cleanse your hands

·         Purify your hearts

·         Lament

·         Mourn

·         Weep

·         Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.

·         Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord

·         Do not speak evil of one another

Do these things instead of what you’ve been doing/ are doing now and these will be your new results:

·         The devil will flee from you.

·         God will draw near to you.

·         The Lord will lift you up.

If you want different, you gotta do different.  But first, you have to accept that what you are still doing is the reason that you are still failing.

Yeah, I know that sucks, but I’m only telling you because I love you.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church in Montgomery, Alabama.

Call  334-288-0577
Email atgravestwo2@aol.com
Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

To hear sermons, read devotions, and learn more about the ministry at Hall Memorial CME Church, visit www.hallmemorialcme.blogspot.com .

If you enjoy our work, please help support our work in the community. Send a donation of any amount by check or money order.
Mail all contributions to :
Hall Memorial CME Church
541 Seibles Road
Montgomery, AL 36116

Proverbs 30: 32, 33. "You Want What? Hush Yo' Mouth!"

Proverbs 30: 32     If you have been foolish in exalting yourself, or if you have devised evil, put your hand on your mouth.
33     For as the churning of milk produces butter,

And wringing the nose produces blood,

So the forcing of wrath produces strife.

Proverbs 30: 32, 33.   You know those people who like to brag about how they got somebody fired, undermined somebody’s reputation, took credit for someone else’s work, or stole somebody’s man/ woman?

God says that those people need to just SHUT UP TALKING.

In Proverbs 30: 32, the Lord says, “Shh!  Shhhhh!  Put your hand over your mouth and zip it!”

Quit telling folks that God promised you somebody else’s spouse.  God doesn’t wanna hear that mess.

Stop praying for God to give you your boss’s job while your boss is sitting in his office with no plans to quit or retire.  You’re asking God to make somebody else unemployed so you can get a raise. 

Shut yo’ mouth.  The Lord ain’t hearing that.

Stop driving through occupied neighborhoods, naming and claiming a house where a family already lives.  You’re asking God to make those people homeless so you can get a granite countertop----- in Jesus name.

When you foolishly pursue personal promotion with no concern for the damage your ambition does to others, you might as well stop talking about the favor of God, because when you act like that, you are outside of God’s will.  And you can’t expect  God’s favor while you are outside of His will.

You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask.

You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. (James 4: 2, 3)

If you take a smooth container of fresh milk and agitate it over time, then the smooth becomes lumpy.  It’s natural cause and effect based on how God has designed milk.

If you grab your perfectly healthy nose, and twist and bend it, your nose will bruise and bleed.  It’s a logical result based on the way God has designed your nose.

In the same way, if you inject yourself into peaceful situations and churn up drama to force people out of the positions you want for yourself, then over time you will feel the natural and logical effect of how God has designed life:  God will withdraw his favor and mercy, and you will be left spiritually naked and alone to reap the pain and suffering of all the strife you have sown.

Ambition isn’t sin.  The problem is SMALL-MINDED ambition. 

It’s ambitious to want a better job.  Nothing’s wrong with that.  Small-minded ambition is when you want a better job, but you think that the only better job the one somebody already has.  The world is bigger than what’s right in front of you. 

It’s ambitious to want a nicer car.  Small-minded ambition is when you act like the only nice car made on earth is the one in the yard across the street.  Get your own, and for goodness’ sake be individual enough not to buy the exact same make and model that’s in the yard across the street.

Small-minded ambition wants what they have. 

Godly ambition wants what God has for you.

Small-minded ambition is not prosperity.  It’s destroying your brother so you can have your brother’s stuff.

That’s coveting.

That’s sin.

When you spread out your hands, I will hide My eyes from you.  Even though you make many prayers, I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean.  Put away the evil of your doings from before My eyes. Cease to do evil.  (Isaiah 1: 15-16)

In other words, Hush yo’ mouth, and quit all that mess.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church in Montgomery, Alabama.

Call  334-288-0577
Email atgravestwo2@aol.com
Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

To hear sermons, read devotions, and learn more about the ministry at Hall Memorial CME Church, visit www.hallmemorialcme.blogspot.com .

If you enjoy our work, please help support our work in the community. Send a donation of any amount by check or money order.
Mail all contributions to :
Hall Memorial CME Church
541 Seibles Road
Montgomery, AL 36116