Lord, Teach us to Pray

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Sermon Transcript November 13, 2011

Lord, Teach us to Pray “Watch and Pray” Matthew 26:36-46 Matthew 6:13

This message from the Bible was addressed originally to the people of Wethersfield Evangelical Free Church on November 13, 2011, at 511 Maple Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109 by Pastor Scott Solberg. This is a transcription that bears the strength and weaknesses of oral delivery. It is not meant to be a polished essay. An audio copy of the sermon on CD is available by request at (860) 563-8286. An audio version of this sermon may also be found on the church web-site at www.wethefc.com. 1

SCRIPTURE PASSAGES Matthew 26:36-46 36 Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, “Sit here, while I go over there and pray.” 37

And taking with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, he began to be sorrowful and troubled.

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Then he said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me.” 39 And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” 40

And he came to the disciples and found them sleeping. And he said to Peter, “So, could you not watch with me one hour?

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Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

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Again, for the second time, he went away and prayed, “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.”

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And again he came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were heavy. 44So, leaving them again, he went away and prayed for the third time, saying the same words again.

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Then he came to the disciples and said to them, “Sleep and take your rest later on. See, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. 46 Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.”

Matthew 6:13 13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

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INTRODUCTION “Watch and pray, that you may not enter into temptation.” These are the words Jesus spoke to His disciples the night He agonized in the Garden of Gethsemane over His pending death on the cross. On one hand, these words from Jesus serve as a warning. Can you hear the warning? “Watch and pray, that you may not enter into temptation.” These words suggest that if you fail to “watch and pray,” you will succumb to temptation. That is the warning. At the same time, these words are instructive. How do you overcome temptation in your life? Jesus is suggesting that you do so by “watching and praying.” Is that not what Jesus is modeling for us in Matthew 26:36-46? When we observe Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, do we not see Him “watching and praying” as He faces His own time of testing? The scene in the Garden that night is rather intense. I don’t think we can fully comprehend the agony Jesus was under as He contemplated becoming sin for us and absorbing God’s holy wrath against all mankind. He was sorrowful. He was troubled by it. He was overwhelmed to the point of death. He actually asked the Father to remove the cross from Him. Heinrich Hoffman is the artist who painted a famous painting of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. It is a picture of Jesus, kneeling in prayer, up against the rock with a nice serene gaze as he looked up into the heavens. It looks like He was in a contemplative and peaceful frame of mind. I think the painting does a disservice to what was happening in the Garden that night. There was a battle raging that night. Somehow, in His humanity, Jesus was wrestling with the thought of going to the cross. Kent Hughes describes this intense battle taking place that night in the Garden of Gethsemane. He writes, “The inner circle of disciples saw Jesus fall prostrate to the ground. From the gospels, we can piece together that He went first to His knees and then to His face. There He prayed that bold prayer that God remove the cup from Him. Hebrews 5:7 tells us, “In the last days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death.” Jesus was a stones throw away from the three. They could see His prostrate form convulse, and they could see His tears and sweat falling to the ground like drops of blood.”1 This was not some serene prayer. Jesus was simply doing what He instructed the disciples to do. This is how you “watch and pray.” It was if Jesus was saying, “do like I do when it comes to fighting temptation.” Here is the sinless Christ, who, in His deity, could not sin; and yet, at the same time, faced a level of temptation that none of us can imagine. And if the sinless, perfect Son of God wrestled in prayer over temptation, how much more should we, who are weak and 3

sinful, learn how to “watch and pray” when it comes to defeating temptation in our lives? Jesus says of us, in verse 41, “The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” That being the case, how much more should we learn to “watch and pray.” Here were Peter, James and John, the three men who formed the “inner circle” of friendship with Jesus. Jesus didn’t have any closer friends than these three men. And yet, during his great time of need, they failed Jesus. He came to them and said to them, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.” And what did they do? They fell asleep. Consequently, when their time of testing came, when Jesus was betrayed by Judas, they scattered and ran for their lives. They deserted Jesus. In a few short moments, while Jesus overcame temptation and drank willingly from the cup of suffering that represented God’s will for him, Peter was heard denying Jesus three times. Peter, “watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation.” The warning and the instruction Jesus gave to Peter, James and John that evening is something each of us should take to heart. James tells us that temptation leads to sin and sin leads to death. We often do not realize how terrible our sin is until we give into temptation and we end up living with the consequences. Sin brings sorrow, broken relationships, hardships, hurt, damage and often it leads deeper and deeper into destructive patterns of living. But it starts with temptation; so Jesus calls for us to be alert and to “watch and pray.” When I think of temptation, I think of dust. You dust a piece of furniture and it looks nice and clean. You work hard to clean the room and you are proud of how good it looks when you are all finished cleaning. But then you glance over at the window and the sun is shining into the room. Through the help of the sun’s rays, you can see small particles of dust floating in the air; and, if you watch carefully, you can actually watch them descend onto that nice clean piece of furniture. Within two days there is dust on the furniture again. It never stops coming. And so it is with temptation. You may withstand one assault, but in the air there is another assault just waiting to happen. Thus, Jesus calls us to be alert, to “watch and pray” lest you fall into temptation. It is a call for constant vigilance. You can’t be lazy and fall asleep in this area. If you do not “watch and pray”, you will give into temptation. With this in mind, it should not surprise us, when we come to the Lord’s Prayer, that the very last petition has to do with our battle with temptation. We are instructed to pray, “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” And because the dust of temptation is around us all the time, we need to daily and constantly pray this prayer. We need to daily lean on the “Rock” and ask for God’s help to do the will of God. 4

GENERAL OBSERVATIONS Before we actually look at this request, I would like to make a couple of observations. First of all, I want you to see how this request stands in connection to the rest of the prayer. Last week we observed the role of the conjunction “and” in the previous request. Well, the entire last half of the prayer is connected by this conjunction. It reads, “Give us this day our daily bread, AND forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors, AND do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” It starts out by asking God to meet our every need and then it asks that our greatest need of all be met the forgiveness of our sins. “And” then we are to ask that we would have the power to resist temptation. Our request this morning is connected to the request for the forgiveness of our sins. The thought goes like this. We love the idea of God wiping our slate clean. Don’t we? The invitation is simply this, “Come and confess your sin and God will wipe your slate clean. He will forgive!” “Hallelujah!” But God only forgives the truly contrite and repentant heart. And it is not truly a contrite heart when we come to God asking for forgiveness, if we are not really interested in a behavioral change. In the gospel presentation we are learning on Monday nights, when you come to the end of the presentation you are instructed to ask the person, “Which way describes the way you want to live? Do you want to live God’s way or your way?” If the person says they want to start living God’s way, you ask them how they are living now. Most likely they will say, “Right now I am living my way.” Then I love the next question. “Do you want to change?” Change what? Change what you believe? That is part of it. But the question is really asking you whether you want to change the way you live. That really gets at the heart of it. Sometimes we present a gospel that does not expect a change in life. But that is not the gospel of Christ. So whether our confession is the confession we make at the point of conversion, or whether it is the daily confession of our sin, the same goal is in view. I want to change the way I am living. So after confessing my sin, I am asking for God’s strength to keep me from giving into temptation; because, at the heart of my confession, I want to change. Jesus is saying that when you confess your sin, don’t forget to ask God then to help you not give into the temptation that led to the sin in the first place. My concern with these two requests is not just to have my slate wiped clean by a gracious God, but it is also my desire to live a holy life. So Father, help me to live a holy life. God, change me. I have one more quick observation about this request in relation to the entire Lord’s Prayer. This request marks the end of the prayer. When we pray the Lord’s Prayer, we often end it by saying, “For thine is the kingdom and power and glory forever, Amen!” 5

The evidence suggests that this phrase was not part of the original prayer, though in one form or another, it is part of the Lord’s Prayer very early within church history. It was standard practice within the synagogue to end a prayer with a benediction or a doxology. The most common Jewish doxology was “Blessed be the name of the glory of His kingdom forever and ever.”2 So it is pretty easy to see how this statement was added to our reciting of the prayer as early as the second century, and there is nothing wrong with this kind of a statement. But it doesn’t seem to be the way Jesus ended the prayer. He ended it with the request, “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil or, it can be translated “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.” I find it interesting that this last request is sandwiched between the cry of confession and the warning, “if you forgive men for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. “But if you do not forgive men, then your heavenly Father will not forgive your transgressions.” Could it be that one of the most difficult temptations to get over in life, that causes us to go to the rock in the garden and wrestle with God, is the temptation to withhold forgiveness? The will of God is to forgive. The temptation is to get even through our bitterness and resentment. It is a tough one. Quite a few of you remarked to me this past week that you have had to deal with forgiveness over an issue that has been in your life for years. It is a supernatural act to overcome the bitterness of the heart that has laid dormant for many years. And so, sandwiched between the call to forgive, is the prayer to resist temptation. I call you to pay attention this morning, because temptation lies around every corner. I am reminded of God’s admonition to Cain all the way back in Genesis 4. He said to Cain, “sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.” Temptation is “crouching at your door” every moment of every day. It desires to have you. And the consequences of giving into temptation do not go away when you confess your sin. Does God free us from guilt? Yes! But does God remove the consequences of our sin? No! The warning is this, If you do not “watch and pray,” as Jesus has demonstrated in the Garden of Gethsemane, you will give into temptation. “Watch and pray, that you may not enter into temptation.” Pray this for the church. Pray this for the spiritual leaders within the church. Pray this for your family and for your children. Be vigilant in prayer over this matter. THE MEANING OF THE PRAYER I want to take some time this morning to wrestle through the meaning of this request, because it is worded rather curiously. “Lead us not into temptation.” What is behind this request? Does it suggest to us that God might possibly lead us into temptation? If you are asking Him not to lead you into temptation, is there the possibility that He might 6

be inclined to lead us into temptation? And yet, that seems contrary to the very nature of God and to what we read about Him in the Bible. In James 1:13, we are told, “When tempted, no one should say, ‘God is tempting me.’ For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone.” James makes a rather strong statement for us this morning that tells us that when we are tempted, we can rest assured that God is not the one tempting us. God does not tempt anyone to do evil. Then, if that is the case, why are we praying that God “lead us not into temptation”? Some have made an attempt to explain it this way. The Greek word for temptation can also be translated “testing” or “trial.” Now we do know that God brings testing and trials into our lives for our own growth. We also know that the mystery of God is that He is sovereign over all things and can even use things that are evil for our own good. I think of the statement, in Deuteronomy 13, where Moses tells the people of Israel not to follow false prophets. He said, “You must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The LORD your God is testing you to find out whether you love Him with all your heart and with all your soul.” How was God testing them there? He was testing them through the presence of the false prophet, and the verse gives you some sense that God was sovereign over the presence of that false prophet. It was His testing of them. And so the prayer, “lead us not into temptation,” is a prayer that God would spare us from the testing of our faith. I have a problem with that because, according to James, we are to count it all joy when we fall into trials. Why? Because Paul tells us, in Romans 5, that our trials are for our good. So if our good is the end result of our trials, why would we pray that God not lead us into trials? J.I. Packer, who holds this view, suggests that while God uses the testing for our good, Satan can use them for evil.3 The intense pressure of our trials, as in the pressure Jesus was under before the cross, can lead to sin. We have all experienced that in the midst of trials. The other week, when many of us lost power, the temptation to grumble and complain increased, did it not? Suffering and trials tend to bring these weaknesses to the surface; and so it is suggested that the request is that God would keep us from this testing time so that we would not fall into greater temptation. I am a rather simple man. I am not overly brilliant and I like simple explanations. I really like the explanation for this request given by D. A. Carson. He resolves the tension of this request by noting that Jesus is using a figure of speech here. It is a point of grammar. The figure of speech that He uses here is called a “litotes.”4 A litotes expresses something by negating the contrary. For example, the expression “not a few” actually means “many”. He uses the negative “not” to negate the contrary “few” and thus, by the statement, he really means “many”. Jesus uses this figure of speech in John 6:37 when He says, “All that the Father gives to me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away.” He could have said it this way. “Whoever comes 7

to me I will welcome.” Instead, He used this accepted figure of speech. The negative is “never” and He negates the contrary “drive away,” which means He will welcome them. So it is with our request this morning, “Lead us not into temptation.” The word “not” is the negative and it negates the contrary “temptation.” So what we are really praying here is that God would lead us into righteousness. We are praying that God would lead us away from what is evil and from giving into temptation. The request does not hold out the possibility that God would tempt us to sin; rather, the request is that God would lead us into what is good and what it right. And in doing so, He would lead us away from the evil one himself. When you go to pray this prayer, keep in mind that you are praying that God would lead you and your family and your church into righteousness. This prayer ought to come from your lips and from your heart every day. I can remember standing before my dad on my wedding day with Bonnie to my left. He was performing our wedding. In the charge he gave us, he looked to me and said, “Scott, since you were young, your mother and I put a hedge of prayer around you.” As I look back on my life, there are times I stood at a crossroad in my life and I was not even looking to do the right thing. But God pulled me out and kept me from giving into temptation. I remember talking with a lady who had just lost her mom to cancer. She began to tell me about the legacy of faith that her mom left behind. She said, with tears in her eyes, every morning after she and her brother left for school, her mom went into their bedrooms and knelt at their beds and prayed for God to lead them into righteousness. Every day she did this. She did it through their high school days, their college days and through their grown up life. She was lamenting the loss of this “prayer covering” in her life. Heaven will speak of the power of the prevailing prayers of moms and dads, of grandparents, as we “watch and pray” for our children and grandchildren. “God, lead us into righteousness and lead us away from the evil one.” WHY WE NEED TO PRAYER THIS PRAYER Let me suggest to you several reasons why you need to pray this prayer, “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.”” There is an evil one: The first reason you need to pray this prayer on a daily basis is because there is an evil one. The devil is real. I know that doesn’t play well in our culture and it is a notion that many scoff at; but, nonetheless, that is the reality presented to us in the Scriptures. A French poet by the name of Charles Baudelaire once wrote, “The devil’s cleverest ruse is to make us believe that he doesn’t exist.”5 8

It is rather instructive for us to find the devil himself present at the fall of man in Genesis 3. The origin of the fall of man can be traced back to the tempting work of Satan. It is Satan who plants doubt in the mind of Eve, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the Garden?” No, God never said that at all. They could not eat of “one of the trees” in the Garden, but God never said they could not eat of any tree in the Garden. See, at the root of temptation, Satan wants you to question the goodness of God. He wants you to question whether or not God has your best interest in mind, and to get you to think that God is out to take away your joy. Then later, Satan comes back with another temptation where he denies the truth of God. He says to Eve, “You will not surely die.” That is in direct opposition to what God had said. God warned Adam and Eve that if they ate of the forbidden fruit, they would indeed die. Through this statement, Satan is denying the truth of God and the judgment of God. Carson says this, “The first doctrine to be denied, according to the Bible, is the doctrine of judgment. In many disputes about God and religion, this pattern often repeats itself, because if you can get rid of that one teaching, then rebellion has no adverse consequences, and so you are free to do anything.”6 If you can remove a God that you need to answer to and some day give account to, then you can do anything you want. That is a lie from the enemy and someday we will give an account for our lives. From this one temptation, “sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.” It is Satan who tempts Jesus, while wandering in the wilderness for forty days, seeking to divert Jesus from the cross. It is Satan who is described to be like “a lion on the prowl, seeking whom he may devour.” We are told that “we do not wrestle against flesh and blood . . . . But against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” There is an enemy who is strong and, if you do not become vigilant by “watching and praying,” he will have his way with you. It was very difficult to look at the evil that came out of Penn State University this week. It became public that a long respected football coach had sexually abused a number of boys, and there were those within the university who covered it up and failed to report it. The coach was loved and respected by his former players, they could not believe this was the man they knew and loved. But as you know, this is an evil that is played out all over our world every single day. Ultimately, the evil one is behind it all. Reflecting on the aftermath of World War II, a German theologian by the name of Helmut Thielicke observed that “there is a dark, mysterious, spell-binding figure at work. Behind the temptations stands the tempter, behind the lie stands the liar, behind all the dead and bloodshed stands the ‘murderer from the beginning’ . . . . Dear friends, 9

in our time we have had far too much contact with demonic forces.”7 You need to pray this prayer because there is an enemy who is seeking to rob, steal, kill and destroy. Therefore, we are told to be alert, to “watch and pray.” We are weak: A second reason we need to pray this prayer for God to lead us into righteousness is simply because we are weak. If I am not vigilant in this area, and if I am not prayerful about it, I will give into temptation. Think of the examples we have in Scripture of our own weakness. I think this morning of Adam, the first man. He was created without sin. John Owen said of Adam, “He had a far greater inherent stock of ability than we, and had nothing in him to entice or seduce him.”8 And yet we know the story. He no sooner faced temptation and gave into it and took the entire human race down with him. Think about it. All he had to combat was the cunning ways of the serpent. He didn’t live in a fallen world, nor did he have a corrupt heart. And yet he gave into temptation. Every “hero of the faith,” after Adam, was weak and gave into temptation. Abraham, the father of faith, lied two times about his wife because he was governed by fear. David, “a man after God’s own heart,” committed adultery and murdered to cover it up. Imagine how the press would deal with that one. His lust, his pride and his power got the best of him. Peter, the best friend Jesus had, flat out denied that he even knew Jesus. He had previously boasted that he would die for Jesus, but when the time came, three times he denied Jesus. Would you at least this morning affirm the intent of this request? You are weak. Can you say that about yourself this morning? You are unable to stand against temptation in your own strength. Daily you must cry for strength that is found in the Lord. I love Johnny Cash. I once read where Johnny Cash said of himself, “I am a C-minus Christian.” Some people may think of themselves as A+ Christians because they keep some list of rules fairly well. But I think it is one who thinks of himself or herself as a C -minus Christian who really gets the passing grade. Because it is an assessment of yourself that is honest and acknowledges that, ultimately, you are weak. I love the prayer that Johnny Cash sings in one of the songs he produced shortly before he died. Listen to these lyrics. Lord help me walk another mile, just one more mile, I'm tired of walking all alone. Lord help me smile another smile just one more smile, I know I just can't make it on my own. I never thought I needed help before, I thought that I could do things by myself. Now I know I just can't take it anymore. With a humble heart on bended knee, I'm begging you please help me. 10

Come down from your golden throne to me to lowly me, I need to feel the touch of your tender hand. Remove the chains of darkness and let me see, Lord, let me see, just where I fit into your Master plan. I never thought I needed help before, I thought that I could get by, by myself. Now I know I just can't take it anymore. With a humble heart on bended knee, I'm begging you please help me. With a humble heart on bended knee, I'm begging you please for help. Watching and praying begins with a confession that we are weak. John Owen observed that there are several seasons in life when temptation seems to really have its way with us. Have you experienced that in your own life? There are times and seasons when temptation seems to be particularly strong. He said that one of those seasons in life is when we experience what he calls the “slumber of grace.”9 What he is saying with this phrase is that God has given us several means of grace by which we fight off temptation. When we slumber and fall asleep in these areas, we become particularly vulnerable to temptation. For example, one of the means of grace that God has given to us is the Bible. We are to be diligent in our study of the Bible. It is our weapon against temptation. Jesus used the Scripture to fight off temptation when He faced the devil in the wilderness. Memorize the Scripture. Meditate on the Scripture. Pray through the Scripture. Another means of grace is prayer, as we see this morning in the Lord’s Prayer. Developing the habit of coming to church and sitting under the Word of God is a means by which God gives us strength. God has given us fellowship with other believers who can hold us accountable and can spur us on to good deeds. This accountability can help us stand against temptation. We need all of these things because, in and of ourselves, we are weak. These things are what it means to “watch and pray.” Jesus said, “watch and pray.” Do not slumber in grace. Are you asleep in these areas? Every now and then you hear a new convert get up and say, “I am going to follow Jesus to the end!” Whenever Kent Hughes hears someone say that, it gives him a thrill, and at the same time, he is a little apprehensive. He pictures in his mind Dorothy and the Tin Man on the Yellow Brick Road skipping hand in hand and singing, “I have decided to follow Jesus.” He said I would rather hear the neophyte say, “I know I can’t do it alone, but by God’s grace I am going to do my best.”10 God’s grace comes to us through His word, through prayer, through the preaching of His word and through the fellowship of God’s people. The minute you go to sleep you are out there on your own and you will not stand. Do not slumber in grace. “Watch and pray, that you may not enter into temptation.” Temptation Island: The third reason you need to be vigilant in praying this prayer is because we live on “Temptation Island.” A few years ago I saw an advertisement for a 11

reality television show called “Temptation Island.” The concept of this show was that four couples were sent to this exotic island where they would be greeted by 26 singles who were there to flirt with them and tempt them to break off their relationship. I never saw an episode of this show, but from the advertisement I was bothered by it. It was not just the promiscuity of the show that bothered me, but rather I was bothered at how the show mocks the idea of playing with temptation. They were celebrating temptation. They were laughing at the idea of others giving into temptation. And they were downplaying the consequences of it. But it struck me, that is exactly where we live life. We live life on “Temptation Island”; and if we do not “watch and pray,” we will give into it. I encourage you to look at Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane and observe the energy and the tenacity with which He fought back temptation. We need the same diligence. Become accountable to someone you trust. Allow someone to ask you the hard questions. How are you treating your spouse and your children? Are you looking at things you shouldn’t? Have you set up appropriate boundaries for yourself? Be vigilant! The enemy is at work all over the place. You are weak, left to yourself. Temptation is all around you. “Watch and pray . . . Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one.” CONCLUSION In conclusion, I would just point out the “last temptation” to overcome is the temptation that comes from “the accuser” who is good at reminding us of our failures, causing us to question God’s forgiveness. Would you rest in the truth that “if we confess our sins, he is faithful to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” So do not give into the temptation that comes with doubting God’s love. ___________________ 1

Kent Hughes, Mark, Volume 2. (Westchester: Crossway Books, 1989) 166. Philip Ryken, When You Pray (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2000) 175 3 J. I. Packer, Growing in Christ (Wheaton: Crossway Books, 1994) 195-196. 4 D. A. Carson, The Sermon On The Mount (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1978) 70. 5 Ryken, 163 6 D. A. Carson The God Who is There (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2010) 31 7 Ryken, 162 8 John Owen, Temptation and Sin (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1958) 103. 9 John Owen, 128-129. 10 Hughes, 169 2

© by Dr. Scott Solberg- All rights reserved 12