Pray To Not Enter Into Temptation

Pray To Not Enter Into Temptation

Luke 22:40 - And when he was at the place, he said unto them, pray that ye enter not into temptation.

This can be used as a very powerful verse in our everyday lives. If Jesus was tempted, then it is a very real thing to know that we will be tempted. But in this verse Jesus says that we can pray that we won't enter into temptation. He never says we won't be tempted, but that He will always make a way out for us.

I Corinthians 10: 12-13 - Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.

It would be a wonderful thing if the thought just popped into our head and we realized it was a temptation to do the wrong thing, and just as quickly we told Satan to leave us alone because we were not 'going there'.

If we pray about this everyday, the Holy Spirit can give us discernment about the temptations that Satan places before us. I think that we have a picture in our minds many times of being tempted to do something big like pornography or stealing or some other thing that we think of as a big sin. Just as easily, though, Satan can tempt us in what we consider small things. Satan can tempt us to be materialistic and not spend our money on things that would honor God. Or he can tempt us to go around doing a bunch of good works at church, or just good works in any other area of our lives.

The above are just two examples of how Satan can tempt us to do things that are not even bad things. These are things that you or no one else would suspect as being anything that was necessarily bad. This is probably the tactic he uses most in the church. If you are not in touch with the Holy Spirit all the time, it is very easy to be led astray. Some things that we are doing now are things that we have done so long that we don't even consider them as wrong. We just seem to get comfortable no matter where we are in life and we don't want the Holy Spirit telling us that we need to make a change most of the time. If he convicts you about anything while you are reading this, please don't brush him off.

God wants to refine us and make us useable vessels for him to do glorious things through, and he can't use us if we are not strong and able to resist the wiles of Satan. When we look back on our lives, I know that we all can see at least 2 or 3 times when we have either made a right or wrong decision and it made a huge difference in our lives from that point on.

This wrong decision didn't have to be a huge thing that we messed up and ruined our lives from then on. I'm talking about looking back and seeing what could have been if we had taken another way instead of the one we took. Then on the other hand, we sometimes can look back and see where we did not give in to our fleshly whims even though we wanted to; and we can see how much better our life is because we stood firm when we needed to.

You should not start thinking that you are not useable if you have really messed up. We have all messed up at one time or another. The whole idea here is to learn from the past and in the future vow to let the Holy Spirit be the CEO of your life. If He is the head, then we won't be as prone to be an "impulse person" that will just be swayed by Satan whenever he pleases. We will learn to quote the Word to him and tell him to leave us alone.

The following four words are taken from the verse Luke 22:40, and are taken from the Greek meanings, tenses, and voices of each word:

PRAY - To pray to God, supplicate, worship, make prayer earnestly. Present Imperative Active - This tense means that the action is accomplished by the subject of the verb (you), used to give a command, and is contemporaneous or living action, happening now, as opposed to past or future.
ENTER NOT - Don't go in or go through. Aorist Infinitive Active - A verbal noun where the action is accomplished by the subject and is simple, undefined action, referring only to the reality of the event.
INTO - To or into - indicating the point reached or entered of place, time, or purpose.
TEMPTATION - The idea of piercing, a test, trial, entice, discipline, scrutinize, a putting to proof, experience implies adversity. Anarthrous Noun - A person, place or thing in the accusative case - direct object of verb - it is intended to point out the quality of something.

Please read and study the above words and realize that you always have a choice not to let Satan lead you into something that will get you off track from following God. For the most part, I think Satan uses more good things to keep Christians off track that he does bad things. We would more easily recognize the bad things and not do them any more. At least if he does use bad things, he makes them not seem so bad in our eyes. He is very good at helping a person justify that what they are doing is OK. He brings up all the circumstances that could be responsible for what a person does and makes them feel a certain behavior is just fine.

Please let the Holy Spirit help you recognize any thing - little or big - that might be keeping you away from the blessings God has for you!!

Home Page

This text is written by Cathy Deaton and is her own work.