Well, it's Friday again on Things Unseen, and we've reached the conclusion of a week

of reflections on the Lord's Prayer, and we've come to the final petition.

I imagine you know that the doxology at the end, for thine is the kingdom and the power

in the glory forever, Amen, was probably added by the early church.

So the last original petition is, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil

or from the evil one.

These may be two petitions, but if so, they're a parallelism.

The second request fills out the first one.

Lead us into temptation, but if we are led into temptation, deliver us from its evil or

from the evil one.

And there's something about this petition that I think makes us ask a question, perhaps

more than one question, but one question is certainly this.

What is meant here by temptation?

The Greek word that's used here, pirasmus, can mean simply a test or a trial.

Or of course, it can actually mean solicitation to sin.

So which is it here?

Well, we're all weak, and no matter how strong we may think we are, there are situations

in life that can very easily break us.

And so at one level, obviously, we want to ask God to protect us.

At the same time, we know that difficult experiences will come.

So we ask Him to protect us from any evil in them.

In a sense, we're simply praying, Father, make Sam 23 come true in my life so that even

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