Deliver Us from Evil

The final request Jesus taught us to make in prayer contains two parts. Lead us not into temptation, but rather deliver us from evil. Keep in mind that the primary request is for deliverance from evil. We appeal to God and believe in Him to do that very thing. We are unable to deliver ourselves from evil, because much of the evil comes from within us. All people have a basic knowledge of what is good and what is evil. This knowledge was put in us at creation. But when created, we only had a knowledge of good. We had no concept nor desire for evil. We were created with a will to obey God and do what is pleasing to Him. But when tempted, we chose to eat forbidden fruit and became those who know both good and evil. We now have an understanding of things that are contrary to the will of God and we have a will to do those things. When tempted, we fell into sin and disobedience. The world is now filled with evil, because evil resides in every person in this world. We long for a world in which righteousness dwells and evil is no longer present. We ask God to deliver us from the evil that surrounds us, and evil men that threaten and oppress us. But we also ask God to deliver us from the evil within us, knowing that He someday will. God has promised to perfect, confirm and strengthen us. (1 Peter 5:10) This means that when we stand in His presence we will be entirely delivered from evil. We will be presented to God "blameless with great joy." (Jude 1:24) When we pray to be delivered from evil, we are claiming a promise that God has made. But until that day, we remain in an evil world fighting the evil within us. So, we ask God not only for that final deliverance promised to us, we also ask for deliverance from the evil that daily threatens us.

This evil tempts us just as it always has from the very beginning. So, we ask God to not only deliver us from evil, but not to lead us into temptation. Two questions need to be answered: Would God ever lead us into temptation? and secondly, if God does lead us into temptation, why would we ask Him not to do so? I think the first question is best answered by the experience of Jesus Christ being tempted by Satan in the wilderness. Notice that "Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted." (Matthew 4:1) He was led into temptation. Yes, God leads us into situations where we are tempted to do evil. Think again of the forbidden fruit in the garden. Who put the fruit there? Know that He is not tempting us with evil (James 1:13) but rather allowing us to be tempted by evil. We are responsible to resist and overcome the temptation to sin much like Jesus Himself did, but Adam and Eve did not. God allows temptation for a variety of reasons, such as the formation of our humility, and the glorification of Jesus who overcame every temptation. The fact that we so often fail and sin when tempted makes us long for freedom not only from evil, but from being tempted with it. This helps answer our second question. Although God may allow us to be led into temptation, we ask Him not to do so because we hate our ability to fail and sin against Him. We know that we are likely to sin when tempted, so we ask not to be led into a situation where we might fail Him once again. Our prayer is for the same God who has promised to finally deliver us from all evil inside and out, to deliver us from evil today as we fight against it. Our prayer is for the same Lord, who was tempted in every way just as we are and yet without sin, guard we who are weak from sinful temptation. And may we look forward to a day when we will never be able to be tempted by evil again.