Awakened to Grace

Chad Roberts: Welcome to Awakened to Grace. I'm Chad Roberts, and I'm so glad you're joining us today. I believe God has connected us for a great purpose. Today, you're going to hear a powerful sermon, but before we get to the sermon, I want to encourage you to check out my new book. It's called Blind Faith: Seeing God Through Darkness. It's published by our partners at Lifeway.

The reason I wrote this book is because I am 100% blind. As I've walked this path of blindness, this path of suffering, I want to teach you how Christians can suffer well. I say that today, my job as a blind pastor is to help people trust a God they cannot see.

You can order the book right now anywhere that books are sold in any format. Even if you're not much of a book reader, you can even get it in audio where you can listen to it. I hope you'll go right now to the official website, which is blindfaith.life. Again, that's blindfaith.life. I hope you'll not only get a copy for you, but I hope you'll pick one up for someone who needs encouragement in their faith today.

So far in this series, let me walk us through where we've been. We began in verse nine of Matthew chapter six with understanding, number one, in week one, the person of the prayer. We learned that God is our Heavenly Father. The reason why that is so important is because God is not like our earthly fathers. God does not fail. God does not disappoint. God does not let us down. He does not sin. God is not like human fathers. He is our Heavenly Father.

The first priority of praying rightly, the first order of prayer, is that we would acknowledge our Heavenly Father before we ever acknowledge our needs, before we ever acknowledge our temptations, before we acknowledge any portion of our life. We say, "You are our Father, hallowed be your name." In other words, we honor, we reverence, and we worship the name of God Almighty. That's the first order.

Secondly, that's the person of the prayer. In week two, we talked about the priority of the prayer. "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." Amen. That may have been one of my personal most favorite sermons the Lord has ever allowed me to preach. We explained what it meant for God's kingdom to come. We explained what it meant in heaven that there is no resistance to God's will, there is no rebellion to God's will. When we live a life submitted to Jesus where there's no resistance and there's no rebellion, the will of God is literally done in our life as it is in heaven, so it is in us.

Many times, I'll pray over my blindness and I'll say, "Lord, as it is in heaven, may it be on the earth." Amen. Thirdly, we saw the provisions of the prayer. "Give us this day our daily bread." Do you know where we get our English word "provide"? It actually comes from the word "pro," which means before. The word "vide" is where we actually get our English word "video," which means to see, to watch. When you put "pro" and "vide" together, as in "provide," it means before there was ever a need in your life, God already saw it and God's already provided for it. Amen. The provision of the prayer.

Then last week, in week four, we saw the pardon of the prayer. We said for many, that's the most difficult part of the Lord's Prayer. "Give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors." Last week, we learned we owe a debt to God that Christ paid. What do we do when others owe a debt to us? We've all sinned against God; that's our debt to him. But what do we do when people sin against us and they owe us a debt? We forgive them their debt as God has forgiven our debt.

Today we come to the fifth portion of our series, and today we're talking about the protection of the prayer. "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one." I just want to break this down today, word for word, phrase for phrase, and may the Lord give us great understanding today. This, in my view, is the most mysterious portion of the Lord's Prayer. There's a big problem with this opening phrase: "Lead us not into temptation." Now, that's a head-scratcher.

The reason why is because what is implied, what Jesus seems to be implying here, is that God at times will lead you into temptation. So is that true? I think so many people fail in their understanding of the Bible because they don't understand how to interpret the Bible. I stumbled along a podcast last night, and it was an atheist podcast, and it broke my heart. It's actually a call-in show where people call in. This man and this woman are the hosts. I was listening last night, and this young guy in his 30s called in from Atlanta, Georgia.

He was sharing how he grew up in a Baptist church, in a conservative church in Atlanta, but after college, he lost his faith and now he doesn't believe in God. Yet there's something in him that tells him there's a God, and he had oh, so little faith left. I listened carefully to his conversation. These two very wicked individuals, let me tell you, they absolutely dismantled what little faith this young man had. It broke my heart. Oh, I would give everything I have to talk to this man.

But this young man kept saying something that perked my ears and bothered me at the same time. He kept saying, "But to me, God is this," or "To me, the Bible is this," or "To me..." This is where we miss it. Let me just tell you frankly, you cannot interpret the Bible, and neither can I. God is his own interpreter. We have clay hands, we have clay feet. You and I don't have the ability to interpret the Bible, so it doesn't matter what you think. It doesn't matter what you feel. It doesn't matter how you were raised. The Bible interprets itself. That's the only way to accurately interpret the Bible.

Here's the phrase that the Bible uses: it's called the whole counsel of God. When you come across a difficult text, a tough text, how do you interpret it? You don't say, "Well, this is how I see it." You don't say, "Well, this is how I feel." The other day I was going to bed, and my little two-year-old, John Mark—he's two and a half—he sleeps right in my back. He was in my back like a doorjamb. But he was going to sleep, and he was in my back, and I started thinking.

You know, John Mark, he's learning a bunch of words, but let me tell you, he has no idea what our mortgage is. He has no idea how much food we buy. He doesn't know how to fill a car with gas. He doesn't know all my responsibilities here. There is a world outside of his that he has no concept of. That little boy, all he knows is how to play. He knows how to fight with his siblings; he knocked his brother's tooth clean out Mother's Day. He knows how when he's hungry, and he knows that mom and dad love him fiercely. Beyond that, he doesn't know much outside his bubble.

The Lord began to minister to me and say, "Chad, you live in this little bubble where I give you your daily bread. You live in this little bubble, and all you know is just the love of God. You have no idea what I manage. You have no idea the capability of all my power. You have no idea how I spoke the world into existence. Oh, Chad, there's so much about me you have no idea. Who am I to tell God you're this or you're not? No, I'll be like Job, I'll cover my mouth and I'll say, 'You are God, and I am not.'" Hallelujah. Amen.

So how do we interpret this? "Lead us not into temptation." This is a problem. This is mysterious to me. What does Jesus mean, "Lead us not into temptation"? Are you ready to learn this morning? Let's dive in. James chapter one, verse 13. What did we say? You interpret the Bible using the Bible. You don't interpret it with your own thinking. You most certainly don't interpret it with your own feeling. You interpret scripture with scripture. So what does the whole counsel of God teach? James 1:13, "When someone is tempted, don't let him say God has tempted me, because God cannot tempt with evil."

So then what does Jesus mean, "Lead us not into temptation"? I think this is what Jesus is saying. See, Christ is the great shepherd, right? The Bible calls him the chief shepherd. If you let God shepherd your life, do you know where he's going to lead you? He's going to lead you beside the still water to restore your soul. God's going to lead you in green pastures. God's going to lead you in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Psalm 23, "The Lord is my shepherd, and I shall not want." Amen.

But verse 14 of James 1 says that when we are tempted, the Bible says we are led away, or another translation there is we are lured away. We are deceived by our own inside, by our own deceptions. This is what I believe Jesus is saying. If you take the whole counsel of God's word, it's not saying that God creates temptation for you. It's not saying that God is the source of temptation for you. I do think that there are temptations that come into our life, but God does not create them. God's not sitting there going, "Hmm, let me just see what she'll do. Let me just see what he'll do." No, the Lord's not going to set you up to fail.

Now, what's interesting is the same Greek word for temptation is the same word for test. So see, here's what you and I have to learn to do: you and I have to have the ability to recognize what's happening in our life. Does it have God's fingerprint on it, or does it have Satan's fingerprint on it? A few years ago, you can go back on the Awakened to Grace app and you can listen to a sermon series I did called Lies We Believe. In that series, we traced the temptations of Christ in Matthew chapter four, and what we learned in that series is that Christ did not go into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil to see if he would pass or fail.

Failure was never in question. Christ endured those temptations—three great temptations—so that he would forever expose Satan's playbook to us, so that we would understand how to handle temptation. That's why he did that. But see, Christ was tempted in every point as we are tempted, yet he was without sin. Friends, do you realize just because you are tempted doesn't mean you've sinned? So many people yield to temptation, so many people fail in temptation because they think, "Oh, I'm already tempted, I might as well. I've already sinned because I've been tempted." No, that's not what the Bible teaches. You fail when you give in to that temptation. Amen.

So what we have to understand is the same Greek word for temptation in James 1:13 and 14 is the same word used for trials and testings in verses two, three, and four. So what's the difference? If you're going to take notes, I want you to note this today. Tests are trials that come from God. They originate on outside circumstances, and they are designed to cause us to grow. The Bible says in James 1 verses 2, 3, and 4, "Count it all joy, brothers, when you encounter trials of various kinds."

You know that word "encounter" right there literally means a calendar appointment. Do you understand that? That when you and I go through trials in life, you know what? God is never shocked. When I faced blindness, God on his throne did not look at that and go, "Oh, no. Oh, this was never supposed to happen to Chad. What are we ever going to do?" Our trials do not surprise God. They're actually scheduled. They're actual calendar appointments. That's why, hear me now, that's why when you face trials, you can count them as joy because God is in control. God is sovereign in your life. God has his fingerprint on them. Amen.

So he says, "Count it all joy when you encounter trials of various kinds, knowing that the testing of your faith produces," and then he goes on with a list of great things: endurance and patience. But then he says in verse 13, "God does not tempt with evil, nor can he tempt with evil," and verse 14 says, "When you are led astray, or when you are lured away, that's when sin, when it is conceived, and when sin grows up, it brings forth death."

So here's my question: can God lead us into temptation? I think the Bible answer is, while God knows you will encounter temptation—case in point, Joseph facing Potiphar's wife—God does not create the temptation. He is not the source of the temptation, but rather what he does is he gives you grace and he gives you strength to go through it. Amen. If you are led by Christ, if he is shepherding your life, you're not going to be led toward temptation and sin; you're going to be led toward the paths of righteousness. Temptation is not going to have quite the grip on you as if you are led in destructive paths.

A few things about temptations, if you want to note this. Number one, we are all vulnerable to temptation. The question is not if I am tempted; the question is when will I be tempted? Temptation touches every single life. I want you to understand, precious friend, I don't care how much you love God's word. I don't care how rooted and grounded you are in your faith. I don't care how careful you are to obey the Lord and live a holy life. You are vulnerable to temptation. You are susceptible to it.

The key is to be able to recognize it when it comes. The key is to be able to tell: is this a test sent from God in order to make me grow, or is this a temptation sent from Satan, from the evil one, that is designed to cause me to fall? See, remember, tests originate from God. They're outside circumstances that are designed to make you grow. The second point to that: temptations originate from Satan, from the evil one. They come from within. How many of you know the dangers within? Pride, greed, jealousy, lust, bitterness, anger—and the list goes on and on and on.

There are things inside of us that if we are not careful and we don't keep a godly check on, there are things that originate from within that are temptations, and they are designed to cause you to fall. When you're able to recognize the difference, then you'll know what comes from God—the tests, the trials. You'll know the purpose—they're designed to cause me to grow and they're outside circumstances. Therefore, I can count it all joy because God's in control of it all.

And then you can recognize what are temptations—things that originate from within, things that are caused by Satan, things that Satan wants to cause to see you fall and to stumble. I want to know what has God's fingerprints on it, and I want to know what has Satan's fingerprints on it. When I can perceive the difference, then I can respond the appropriate way.

Number two, because we are all susceptible, because we're all vulnerable to temptation, I want you to understand this: temptation is inevitable. It's unavoidable. You will face it. The question is, can you recognize it? Martin Luther said it so well. He said, "Birds can fly around my head, but I don't have to let them build a nest." Temptation, listen, friends, you can face an onslaught of temptation, but you don't have to sin. Do you understand? Dietrich Bonhoeffer said it so well. He said, "Temptation is in the bait, but sin is in the bite." Satan may put baits out in front of you, but you don't have to bite. Temptation is in the bait, sin is in the bite. When you learn the difference, you'll be able to face temptation. You'll be able to not enter into temptation. You'll be able to prevent it.

We understand that for many, they're unable to attend a church. For some people, it's that they don't have the health to be able to go. For some, their jobs prevent them from going. If you are someone that you sort of feel isolated when it comes to church, well, we want you to know that you can always connect with us. We don't want to see a media like ours completely replace a church because it's important to belong to a fellowship. But for those who are struggling right now in their church life, we want you to know you can always contact us for prayer.

You know, we have a very strong prayer team. When we receive a prayer request, as we receive hundreds and hundreds throughout the year—several thousand will come in—as we receive prayer requests, do you know that our prayer team will spend the next 30 days praying for those requests? So I want you to always feel free to contact us. The best way to submit a prayer is either through our website, preachingchristchurch.com, or through our mobile app called Awakened to Grace.

On either of those two platforms, you can select "Submit a Prayer," and when that prayer request comes, it not only comes to myself and a couple of our other pastors, but it comes to our prayer team leader, and from there it disperses throughout all of our team. Then, of course, on our weekly Tuesday night prayer meetings, we pray for all of the requests that come in.

Now, you can submit prayer confidentially, and when a prayer request comes in that is confidential, only myself and our other pastors see it. We don't share confidential details with the prayer team. But if you want to share details—and we love that because we know how to pray specifically—then you are welcome to do so. We would love to know where you're listening from and how to pray more effectively for you. So we hope to hear from you very soon and how to stand with you in your circumstance in prayer.