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Sermons on the Lord's Prayer.

SERMON

MATT. vi, 13.

VII.

AND LEAD US NOT INTO TEMPTATION.

ancient writer has well remarked upon the connection of these words with those which

precede them, that they look

naturally to the future "Remit the sins (the

as the former do to the past. punishment of the sins,) which we have committed, and grant that we may not commit others,"* and amid the various explanations which have been given or attempted of this clause of the Lord's Prayer, this is after all the simplest and the truest.

It cannot be denied that the words themselves involve a difficulty, and that one of those grave

• St. Augustin Serm. xlviii, 8. Dimitte quæ fecimus, et da ut alia non committamus.

difficulties which arise from an apparent contradiction between different passages of Scripture. How,

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it may be said, can we pray that God will not LEAD US INTO TEMPTATION, when it is written, Let no man say that he is tempted of God; for God cannot be tempted of evil, neither tempteth He any man?"* And it was this circumstance in all probability which induced others to write, "suffer us not to be led into temptation," though the original text of the gospels does not authorize the change.†

Now one solution of the difficulty may be found in the two different senses of the word temptation, a general and a particular one. In the former, the verb to tempt means in Scripture language no more than to try, or make trial of, which is indeed its primary signification; in the latter it means definitively to try by holding out inducements to commit evil. In the former sense then a temptation may be nothing more than an occasion by which the virtue or sin, the faith or unbelief, the obedience or rebel

James i, 13.

+ St. Augustin (De Dono Perseverantiæ, cap. vi, § 12,) mention the change as found in St. Cyprian. Others, he says, had followed and notices it as a Latin alteration not warranted by the Greek MSS. It is not however found in the Vulgate.

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lion of any person may be tested or proved. Thus God is said to have "tempted Abraham," when he demanded of him the sacrifice of his only son Isaac.* So also we find Him thus addressing the children of Israel, Thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee and to prove thee, to know what was in thy heart, whether thou wouldest keep His commandments or no," where the word prove is only a translation of that which is elsewhere rendered to tempt.

Indeed the word is sometimes used in a sense absolutely and exclusively good; that is by temptation we are only allowed to understand an opportunity for the exercise, or development of virtue and holiness. Thus all the difficulties and trials of our Lord's condition upon earth are so called, though we have no reason to suppose that there was any exercise of temptation upon him in the ordinary sense of the word, except at the commencement and the close of His ministry. "Ye are they," said He to His disciples, "which have continued with me in my temptations." So again St. Peter addresses Luke xxii, 28.

* Gen. xxii, 1.

+ Deut. viii, 2.

those to whom he writes as "greatly rejoicing though now for a season in heaviness through manifold temptations, that the trial of their faith being more precious than of gold, which perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise, and honour, and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ."* And St. James bids them "rejoice when they fall into divers temptations."+ In all which passages it would seem that as much tribulation is the portal through which most men have to enter into the kingdom of heaven, so temptation is almost synonymous with affliction. And so it was that through all those trials which Satan was permitted to make of the fidelity of Job,—trials which perhaps for extent and duration have been unparalleled in the annals of human suffering,-distress of mind, and anguish of body formed the instruments of which the Tempter availed himself. But the very fact that these trials are absolutely necessary for us, that our faith may be found in the day of the Lord, laudable, glorious, and honourable, may suffice to show us that it cannot be against these, or at least not against these alone that our Lord bids us pray. + James i, 2.

* 1 Peter i, 6, 7.

Perhaps our weakness would naturally entreat to be spared affliction, and it may be in some sense excusable to do so, though surely not wise, since who would presume to seek exemption from that, which is not only the common lot of all men, but also an essential part of God's system of government. It might almost seem a contradiction of the former prayer, Thy will be done.

Surely then we here pray against temptation in its most commonly received acceptation, as an occasion of sin, nay more, an inducement to do evil. Nor must we shrink from so applying the words. "He who does a thing by another's agency, does it by himself,” is an axiom accepted in the law of morals and religion. And not only is it obviously true that the Evil One could tempt no one except by permission of the Almighty; but we have also some remarkable examples recorded of that permission being distinctly and expressly granted, nay more, of one of Satan's host, if not Satan himself, being in a special manner commissioned to tempt different individuals. In the case of Job we find that "the Lord said unto Satan, Behold all that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand ;"* and • Job i, 12.

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