Temptation has two parts in it--the circumstances which lead to sin, the desire which is addressed by them. There must be tinder as well as spark, if there is to be flame. Fire falling on water or upon bare rock will kindle nothing. God sends the one, we make the other.
The Prayer:--
I. Expresses our recognition of God as ordering all circumstances.
There is the general faith that His Providence orders our lot, and the specific that God orders and brings about temptations.
To tempt is to present inducements to sin, but a secondary significance is to do so maliciously, and with desire that we should fall. It is in this secondary sense that James denies that God tempts any man. We tempt ourselves, or evil tempts us. But God does tempt in so far as He presents outward circumstances which become occasions of falling or of standing, as we take them. He sends temptations, He sends trials, and the two only differ in name, and in what is implied in the word, of the disposition of the sender. Christ was led into the wilderness by the Spirit to be tempted. If God does not in malice tempt, still He does in mercy try. God sends trials; we make them temptations.
II. Implies that our chiefest wish is holiness, our greatest dread sin.
This is the only negative petition.
What would be _our_ deprecatory prayers? Lead us not into sorrow, loss, poverty, disease, death?
How we fill our prayers with womanish shriekings and fears!
This petition can come only from a man whose will is resigned and fixed on God. One thing he fears, and that is to sin.
The one thing to be desired is not outward well-being, but inward character.
Think of our lives: what do we dread most?
III. Expresses our self-distrust.
It is from consciousness of our weakness that we pray thus. The language at first sight seems to breathe only a wish to be exempt from temptation. If that were its meaning, it were contrary to Christ's teaching and to the whole tenor of Scripture. But such a wish _is_ included in it, and corresponds to one tone of mind, and to what ought always to be our feeling. We rightly shrink from temptation because we know our own weakness. That is the only allowable ground; if we do it from indolence, or dread of trouble, we are wrong. If flesh shrinks from pain, we are 'carnal and walk as men.' If we desire simply to have a smooth path, then we have yet to learn what our Master meant when He said, 'In the world ye shall have tribulation.' His servants should 'count it all joy when they fall into divers temptations.'
But if we rightly understand our own weakness, we shall dread to meet the enemy, because we know how often circumstances make all the difference between saint and sinner.
IV. Expresses our reliance on God if temptation comes.
I take to be 'tempted' as being presentation of inducement to sin. I take to 'enter into temptation' as the further step of consenting to it.
Perhaps there may be hovering in the words of the petition a half-conscious allusion to a captive being led into a prison.
What we should chiefly desire is that God would lead us not _into_, but _through_ and _out of_, temptation. To pray simply for exemption from trial is--
1. To ask what is impossible.
All scenes of life, all stages, both sexes, all relations, all professions, are and ever will be full of inducements to sin.
Whether any given circumstance will tempt you or not depends on what you are. If there is nothing adhesive on you, it will not stick.
2. To ask what would not be for our good.
Effect of conquered temptation on the Christian life.
Effect on character. The old belief that the strength of a slain enemy passed into his slayer is true in regard to a Christian's overcome temptations.