September 4

Job 24:13-27:23
Psalm 105:28-36
Proverbs 21:27-28
1 Corinthians 10:6-24

“Lord, Help Me”
God is faithful, and He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able.
—1 Corinthians 10:13

One perspective on the phrase “Do not bring us into temptation” tells us that if we pray for the ability to recognize temptation when it comes our way, then we will be able to confront it and turn it to advantage.

Another interpretation explains that this is a prayer for us to be kept back from more temptation than we can cope with. It’s like saying: “Lord, help us not to get involved in more temptation than we can handle.” This view, as I am sure you can see at once, makes good sense and could well be what Jesus meant.

One of the biographers of an intrepid missionary tells how, in his early days in China, Hudson Taylor met with several great disappointments. One day, after a spate of troubles, he took hold of a guide who had demanded an outrageous fee from him, and shook him violently. A few hours later, he realized he had denied his Lord by this action, and after searching his heart for the reason why he had succumbed to anger and violence, he realized that he had been so preoccupied with his problems that he had failed to commit his ways to the Lord. His biographer says: “If Hudson Taylor had prayed the prayer, ‘Lead us not into temptation,’ and committed his ways to the Lord, then perhaps the Spirit would have been able to direct his path so that he would not have faced more temptation than he could bear.”

It is an intriguing thought.

Prayer
Father, though the meaning of this phrase is not yet clear, one thing is—I need Your help at every stage of my earthly pilgrimage, for I cannot face temptation alone. So stay with me, every day and every hour. For Jesus’ sake. Amen.

Further Study
Ac 5:1-11; Pr 1:10; 4:14; Rm 6:13
Why did Ananias and Sapphira yield to temptation?
What is Paul’s antidote?

Every Day with Jesus Daily Bible – September 04