1. What is meant by the word "trespasses" in this petition? 2. What do we ask our heavenly Father to do in this prayer? 3. How do we know that God will forgive us our sins? 4. How has Christ earned forgiveness of sins for us? 5. For whose sake, therefore, do we ask forgiveness? 6. What special reason have we to include this petition in our prayers? 7. Why are we unworthy of the things for which we pray? 8. What, on the contrary, have we deserved? 9. What moves God to hear our prayers? 10. What words does our Lord add to this petition? 11. What promise do we give God when we add these words? 12. How are the sins our neighbor commits against us to be regarded as compared with our sins against God? 13. What should we therefore willingly do? 14. What will happen to us if we do not heartily forgive our neighbor? 15. What must we be willing to do in addition to forgiving our neighbor? 16. What should induce us to forgive our neighbor when he trespasses against us?
LESSON 45.
The Lord's Prayer.
The Sixth Petition.
Which is the Sixth Petition?
Our Father who art in heaven, lead us not into temptation.
What does this mean?
God indeed tempts no one; but we pray in this petition that God would guard and keep us, so that the devil, the world, and our flesh may not deceive us, nor seduce us into misbelief, despair, and other great shame and vice; and though we be assailed by them, that still we may finally overcome and obtain the victory.
1. "And lead us not into temptation," this is the Sixth Petition. Our Catechism explains it in the first place by saying: "God indeed tempts no one," that is, He tempts no one for evil. That is most certainly true. Our heavenly Father is the holy God. He hates sin and all those who willingly commit it. How could He tempt us to sin, try to lead us into evil ways which He hates? Scripture tells us: "Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God; for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth He any man; but every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lusts and enticed." Jas. 1,13.14.
2. As God does not tempt us for evil, why, then do we pray our Father not to lead us into temptation? We pray "that God would guard and keep us" that our enemies may not lead us into sin and shame. There are such as always try to lead us, the children of God, into sin, those enemies of whom we heard in the Third Petition—the devil, the world, and our own flesh. Our most dangerous foe is the devil. "Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour; whom resist steadfast in the faith." 1 Pet 5,8.9. Remember how he tempted Adam and Eve in Paradise and seduced them to fall into sin. Our next enemy is the world, that is, all the wicked men around us. How often do our friends or schoolmates entice us to do wrong! "My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not." Prov. 1,10. The third enemy is our own flesh, our old sinful heart, which is full of evil lust. Our own lust draws us away from God and entices us to sin.
3. These our enemies have an evil will against us. They want to lead us away from God and our salvation, to lead us again into the kingdom of Satan and sin. They try with all their power and cunning to deceive us; they try to give us the impression that it would be good for us to follow their temptations. By such enticements they try to seduce us to lead us astray from God and His Word, into misbelief, into a wrong faith, or into despair, so that we abandon all hope for our salvation. (Remember Cain, Gen. 4,15, and Judas, Matt. 27,4.5.) Or they try to lead us into other great shame and vice, into sins that will bring shame upon us, to yield to evil passions, which will destroy our faith.