The Lord's Prayer - Part Six

 

Now Jesus is praying for us. He's praying for us because He knows our peril. There's a peril in being in the world. There's great danger in being in the midst of Philadelphia. I'm not talking about going down the streets where the hoodlums are. I'm talking about the danger in some churches of just having everybody say, "It's all nice, it's all nice," and you have just enough inoculation to keep you from catching reality. It's possible to be inoculated with religion that keeps you from catching reality. But what we must do is have that inoculation which makes us resistant to all of the viruses that would destroy our spiritual life. We must realize that in being joined with Christ, we are in a perilous position, because the world hates Him.

 

So in verse 15 He says, "I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the world." Now it might seem logical, if this world is such a terrible place to say, "Lord, why don't You take us home to heaven?" In the Old Testament two men asked God to let them die, and God didn't answer the prayer of either one of them. Elijah said, "Here I am under the juniper tree and I alone am left. I want to die." (See 1 Kings 19:4.) And Jonah, when he had preached and come out of Nineveh said, "It will be a whole lot better for me to die." (See Jonah 4:3.) God didn't answer the prayers of either of them. What God does say is, "I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the world, but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil," that is, from Satan. In other words, God is saying, "It's a whole lot better for you to live in Philadelphia and have the victory over evil than it is for you to go to heaven."

 

As a pastor, I've had occasion to visit in homes where someone in the prime of life says, "Grandmother is in here. Come and see. Oh, Pastor, please pray that the Lord will take her home to heaven." No! No! No! The Lord Jesus prays, "I pray not that thou shouldst take them home to heaven."

 

"Oh, but it makes things so difficult for us." That's just what you need, Grandmother living with you as an invalid for ten years. It could be just the sandpaper needed to cut you down to size.

 

"Oh, but it is such a block on all our desire." That's right. This is the reason why God is allowing these things to happen. "Oh, but it would be such a deliverance. Grandfather's mind is failing. He comes and says, `Did I ever tell you about the story when I was a boy?"' Yes, he's told it 7,324 times. That's the way old people are. And you middleaged people, as your parents grow older, don't forget that you're going to face this fact. And when this happens, it gives you the responsibility of caring for them in the midst of a world that says, "Put them away," "Get them out of sight," "We'll make every sacrifice to put them away where they won't be under our feet." But the Lord says, "I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the world, but that thou shouldst deliver them from the evil one."

 

God is saying that victory over the world is better than separation from the world, because when He leaves us right here and allows us to triumph over all circumstances and keeps us in joy, this is triumph.

 

You'll notice that He asks God to keep us. He doesn't say, "Give them the power to keep themselves." I can't keep myself. In 1 Peter 1:5 you read this great fact about this keeping. "Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time." Now let's go a little further.

 

In John 17:16 Jesus repeats what He said in verse 14, but He means a different thing this time. In verse 16 He says, "They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world." And back in verse 14 He said, "They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world." Why did He repeat it? In verse 14 He is telling why the world hates the believer. In verse 16 He is using this phrase in order to ask the Father to keep us from evil. Since we are not of the world, we must be kept by Him.

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