Jesus's Teaching on Prayer, Part 10
Deliver Us From Evil
Matthew 6v13b
7th November 2025
Last time, we considered the first part of the sixth petition of the Lord's Prayer:
Matthew 6v13
"And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil."
We now consider the second part. Firstly, we notice that some English translations say "deliver us from evil" and others say "deliver us from the evil one". I'm not sure which is correct but it seems to me that they they amount to much the same thing. As Matthew 4 tells us, the devil himself is the tempter:
Matthew 4v1-3
Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the
devil.
After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.
The tempter came to him and said, "If you are the Son of God, tell these
stones to become bread."
The difference between being protected from the devil who tempts and being protected from the temptations the devil sends is a small one. As John Calvin said, "There is no necessity of raising a debate on this point, for the meaning remains nearly the same."
We must be careful not to blame the devil for our sin. It's true that God allows him to tempt us but we don't have to succumb to that temptation. Paul tells us:
1 Corinthians 10v13
No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. 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
endure it.
There is always a way out, but sometimes we choose not to take it. Sometimes we even choose not to look for it. The devil makes our lives difficult but we are nevertheless responsible for our decisions. As James tells us:
James 1v14-15
each person is tempted when his is dragged away by their own evil desire
and enticed.
Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it
is full-grown, gives birth to death.
The devil hates us and wants to damage us any way he can. Therefore:
1 Peter 5v8-9
Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a
roaring lion looking for someone to devour.
Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family
of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of
sufferings.
Temptation in the sense of being attracted to the idea of committing a sin is not the devil's only weapon against us. The Greek word peirasmos, which is translated as "temptation" here can also be translated as "trial" or "testing". In 1 Peter 1v6 Peter writes "for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials". In Galatians 4v14, Paul writes "my illness was a trial to you.". We're not only assailed by desires and opportunities to sin, but with all kinds of problems and pain. Job suffered many calamities at the devil's hand, as portrayed in Job 1v1-2v7. So do many Christians today. It's good to pray to be protected from evil, or from the evil one.
Suffering is not temptation in itself, but it can make us more vulnerable to temptation. We can choose sin as a distraction from our troubles. We can fall into self-pity and stop supporting our local church. We can be so focussed on our own difficulties that we neglect to help other people with their problems and pain. And so on.
I really want, and I hope you want, to dwell in God's kingdom, as a good child in God's family, as part of God's church:
Psalm 27v4
One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in
the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of
the Lord and to seek him in his temple.
I know there is is a struggle with me. I really want more of Jesus. I really want to please my heavenly Father, but part of me really wants all sorts of stuff that really does not please my heavenly Father. Paul writes eloquently about this struggle:
Romans 7v21-25
... I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right
there with me.
For in my inner being I delight in God’s law;
but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind
and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me.
What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject
to death?
Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my flesh a
slave to the law of sin.
Therefore I pray, "Father, keep me away from temptation, and deliver me from the tempter. I don't want to slip back into living the way the world lives. I want to live for you. Amen."