Enduring Temptation

James 1:12-16

            I was praying the Lord’s Prayer with a group of colleagues. The problem became immediately recognizable. Some of us still use the old language; others of us were using the new version of the prayer. I can use the new version – but, since I memorized the old language, I have to read it or really concentrate on the words to get it right. Somehow, that needed concentration takes me out of the “prayer feeling” the old language provides.

            The truth of the matter is that both have their advantages. The old language is comfortable and poetic. The new language of the Lord’s Prayer is neither comfortable nor poetic, but it is more accurate. Where, you might ask. In the petition lead us not into temptation… The problem is obvious when we read this James text.

            The first thing that St. James wants us to see is that temptation must be endured. I understand that to mean that, by definition, temptation is attractive. We aren’t tempted by what we do not desire. What we desire is attractive to us and promises gratification of one sort or another. So, in order to overcome temptation we must endure. Endure means to see it through, to get past it or “outlast it.” A friend of mine was fond of saying that sin was taking the easy way out. I think that means giving into temptation or acting for the immediate gratification.

Discipleship lesson: Facing and enduring temptation grows Christian character and the strength to deal more effectively with the next one.

            The problem with the petition of the Lord’s Prayer, as we usually say it, is that it suggests that God is the author of temptation. James says that is simply untrue. We read: No one, when tempted, should say, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil and he himself tempts no one.

            The wording of the Lord’s Prayer gives us the wrong idea of God. God doesn’t intentionally place us in a position to be tempted. Why? because temptation is, by definition, a tool of the Devil. Evil, biblically, tries to seduce us into the immediate at the expense of the eternal. We choose the present gratification at the expense of the greater good or value. God will never lead us into such situations. In order to do so, God would have to act on behalf of or lead us into evil.

            Lord Jesus, remind me that you do not lead me into temptation but are there to help me overcome it. Amen