Deliver Us From Evil

“…And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil…” Matthew 6:13

Going back to yesterday's post for moment, let me say that what we have come to know as The Lord’s Prayer, is scripture and a beautiful prayer, if we pray it with very deliberate meaning applied to each and every word, as it should be. It is valuable for us to memorize just as all other scripture is equally valuable to be memorized.

But many millions more of us only recite it by rote, as numbed in the repetition of it as so many couch-potatoes are numbed by too much television watching. And therein lies my problem with repetitious prayer. It allows one to “think” that they are praying, whether they are “thinking” about the words or not. Whereas, when we pray as the Spirit leads us, there is nothing mind-numbing about it.

My point is that our prayers must be more than recital alone, they cannot stop there. The Lord’s Prayer is only a training ground for prayer, in a sense; one that has very important elements to be gleaned from it’s example:

a) Giving God glory and praise, as is His due. Humbling ourselves as we do so, bowing (in our hearts at least) in utmost respect to Him.

b) Proclaiming our unity with God’s plan to restore His Kingdom to this earth, the place that His Kingdom occupied.

c) Bringing our needs before God, showing our reliance on Him alone. Giving voice to the fact that we know that all that we have comes by Him, by His goodness and provision towards us. Stating that our trust is in Him, not in ourselves.

d) Asking forgiveness for our transgressions against God and against others, acknowledging God’s Word of Truth that says if we do not forgive others, neither will we be forgiven by God.

e) Asking God to change our hearts (which is where the temptations originate….being taken captive by the lusts that we allow to exist in our hearts.)

f) Asking for divine protection from the wiles of the enemy, who most certainly will focus more steadfastly on us as we begin to change our world by our prayer.

g) Proclaiming God as ruler of this universe, now and forever.

AMEN.

But today I want to focus on the next to the last element: “deliver us from evil”, or as I paraphrased it, asking for divine protection from the wiles of the enemy.

Paul says, in Ephesians 6:19-18: “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”

As we learn how to pray, and spend time doing so, we must realize that we are praying against the “wiles of the devil” or as Jesus said “the works of the devil” that He came to destroy. And He did.

He reclaimed men’s bodies that had been possessed by Satan. He bore stripes that provided our complete healing, if we believe and receive it. He told us that we would do even greater works than He did. And look what Jesus received from the world for all that He delivered them from.

Jesus didn’t just haphazardly throw in that bit about “deliver us from evil” when instructing us to pray. He knew firsthand what forces would come against Him and what forces still today will come against us as we battle spiritually with those principalities and powers of darkness that rule this world! And yet He overcame. And by His overcoming, He has provided for us an arsenal of weapons and armor to be used in the battle, so that we too will overcome.

But if we go into battle without the weapons the Lord has provided for our use, we should not be surprised when the enemy sends us retreating into the hills, or disables us completely. And the thing is: Satan has already been defeated! So, we are being attacked and forced into retreat by an already defeated enemy!

Since the enemy is already defeated, our mission is to outfit ourselves militarily (spiritually speaking) and prepare to enter into hostile occupied territories, in order to reclaim what rightfully belongs to the King. We are going in to take back the ground that the enemy stole from our Lord. The legalities have all been taken care of, the Prince of the Kingdom handled all the negotiations.. But the enemy, as usual, is ignoring the legalities. We are the spiritual U.N. (and doing a much better job of it, by the way, thanks to the Lord!)

But we cannot enter enemy-occupied areas without the main weapon in our arsenal, the Holy Spirit. This is, after all, a spiritual battle, not a physical one. It is critical to us to remember this. Paul further instructs us in that same chapter of Ephesians to pray “always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit” and to continue "watching with all perseverance and supplication for all saints”. In other words, we are to have each others backs!

We are the saints, those of us who claim Jesus Christ to be our Lord and Savior, a spiritual "Band of Brothers". Praying “in the Spirit” for one another is using the “big guns” against the enemy; without the Spirit, we are shooting paper wads through a straw, and we, our brothers, and innocents all over the world will continue to be defeated and even destroyed by an illegal-pretender-king. “Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.” First Peter 5:8 In other words, the enemy is raging mad now that the legalities have been finalized. Watch out now, more than ever before!

Our efforts are focused both on regaining occupied territory that belongs to the kingdom of God, as well as not losing ground that has already been reclaimed for us by Jesus. So what are the things that we are battling to take away from the enemy?

Well, here’s four that are at the top of my list today, for various reasons; your top four may be completely different, and if we let the Spirit of God leads us as we all pray, all areas to be reclaimed will be covered by prayer:

-the lives of innocent babies being horribly killed every day [There have been 49,551,703 abortions in the U.S. alone since the Roe v Wade court decision in 1973. Source: http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/facts/abortionstats.html]

-the lives of children and teens being forced into the sex trade [In the U.S. alone there are 100,000 believed to be enslaved in sex-trafficking. Source: http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime]

-young teens getting high on prescription drugs (my own grandson told me this weekend how prevalent it is in his middle school) [While illicit drug use has declined among youth, rates of nonmedical use of prescription and over-the-counter (OTC) medication remain high. Prescription medications most commonly abused by youth include pain relievers, tranquilizers, stimulants, and depressants. In 2006, 2.1 million teens abused prescription drugs. Teens also misuse OTC cough and cold medications, containing the cough suppressant dextromethorphan (DXM), to get high. Prescription and OTC medications are widely available, free or inexpensive, and falsely believed to be safer than illicit drugs. Misuse of prescription and OTC medications can cause serious health effects, addiction, and death. Source: http://www.cdc.gov/HealthyYouth/alcoholdrug/index.htm]

-continued attacks against public use of anything related to Christianity in this country whose President claims that we are “no longer a Christian nation” [Muslim groups reacted angrily Wednesday after it emerged that the U.S. military is using combat rifle sights inscribed with coded Biblical references. "This situation is not unlike the situation with U.S. currency," said the spokesman, Air Force Maj. John Redfield. "Are we going to stop using money because the bills have 'In God We Trust' on them? As long as the sights meet the combat needs of troops, they'll continue to be used." Source: one of today’s articles at http://www.foxnews.com/story - today]

Those are just the few that come quickly to my mind today either because of having just read the news or having discussions with friends or family during the week. And the ones that quote statistics are just stats from the U.S. alone, I hope you saw that. So how many lives are being destroyed all over the globe…by an entity that is defeated! Only the Word has not gotten out yet all over the world, and even here at home, that his tyranny is no longer real! That all have been set free from the tyranny! The dictator has been deposed, has no legal rule over them any longer, and the land has been restored to the inhabitants! They just don't know it or believe it....YET. That’s why we pray.

If we do not pray “in the Spirit”, with the Spirit leading us and marching us in the right direction, so that the enemy is properly exposed and turned back, if we pray non-thinking recitals instead, the news headlines will not change, except for the worse, as the powers of darkness grow darker still.