Lead Us Not into Temptation

“Lead us not into temptation”

The Pope recently made this change to the Lord’s Prayer:  “Lead us not into temptation” to “Do not let us fall into temptation”.

Pope Francis gave this explanation:  “I am the one who falls; it’s not him pushing me into temptation to then see how I have fallen.  A father doesn’t do that.  A father helps you to get up immediately.  It’s Satan who leads us into temptation.  That’s his department.”

Any good father understands a person’s entire existence is enveloped in temptations.  Some temptations are not to do evil but they are doing something less than best.  For instance, I might be tempted to watch a football game when my wife wants me to fill the car with petro.  Is watching a game evil?  No!  Is it a temptation to do something less important?  Yes!

So God created a perfect place for Adam and Eve and called it “very good!”  That place had a forbidden tree – a temptation.  Remember temptations are NOT sin!  To disobey a rule, your word, or an expectation by submitting to a temptation is a sin.  The temptation itself is not sin!

A good father does not seek to eliminate all temptations from his children for, first off, it is impossible, and secondly, parenting is teaching children to understand temptations and flee them.  Therefore, a father with a crawler or toddler will purge the room of all things dangerous and of most temptations but not all for part of parenting is teaching children what “No” means and that there are consequences to yielding to a temptation.   When done early and often – this training – the child will be much better equipped when on their own in the great, big, tempting world.

The traditional rendition of the Lord’s Prayer, “lead us not into temptation”, is asking that God would reveal or warn of temptations and thus help us to avoid or reject them.  [Heb. 2:18, For in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted, He is able to aid those who are tempted.]  The Pope’s idea that the original wordage is suggesting that God is about tempting us to sin is contrary to other Scriptures and God’s holy nature (Ps. 141:4, Matt. 5:48).  If the Pope is right, then when we do fall we have the right to blame God.  That is simply wrong!

James 1:12-14, 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.  Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone.  But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed.

It is helpful to distinguish between a temptation and a trial or testing.  James 1:2-3, My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.  From these verses in James we can say that testings are God’s tools to mature us, know what others experience, or let God’s power show in us while temptations, when submitted to, are sins that hurt us, others, and God’s reputation.

The Pope, while seeking to “help” God, has actually misrepresented God.  God is not about our pain and loss which happens when submitting to a temptation.  Rather, it should be our strong desire that we don’t fall into sin and thus we ask God to guide us through temptations.