God's Presence in Your Suffering
Seeing Christ's Bounty in the Afflictions of This Life
Good Morning,
As we come to a close in the Larger Catechism (only one more left!) we arrive at a long answer to a short question. Our divines are nothing if they are not exhaustive in the way they help us to understand, in this case, God’s word. We can complain sometimes, but the time we spend in thinking about what our Lord does for us are always rewarded. The matter at hand in this part of the Lord’s Prayer concerns daily life. While each of the petitions do that to an extent what Lead us not . . . desires to express is that the providence of God be ever on our mind.
When we wake in the morning and go to bed in the evening our plea is that our steps would be guided and guarded by the one who made Heaven and Earth. Simply as we ask to be preserved from the wiles of sin and saved from the designs of the evil one on our soul and body we are to keep in mind the promises of Psalm 23:2, “He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters.” These testimonies of blessing and safety are only available to the sheep who feed on grace through the shed blood of the Lamb. It’s why Jesus has given us this prayer that we might model our conversations with the Father based on our love for His care.
Here's the Q/A for today:
Q. 195. What do we pray for in the sixth petition?
A. In the sixth petition, (which is, And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil,) acknowledging, that the most wise, righteous, and gracious God, for divers holy and just ends, may so order things, that we may be assaulted, foiled, and for a time led captive by temptations; that Satan, the world, and the flesh, are ready powerfully to draw us aside, and ensnare us; and that we, even after the pardon of our sins, by reason of our corruption, weakness, and want of watchfulness, are not only subject to be tempted, and forward to expose ourselves unto temptations, but also of ourselves unable and unwilling to resist them, to recover out of them, and to improve them; and worthy to be left under the power of them: we pray, that God would so over-rule the world and all in it, subdue the flesh, and restrain Satan, order all things, bestow and bless all means of grace, and quicken us to watchfulness in the use of them, that we and all his people may by his providence be kept from being tempted to sin; or, if tempted, that by his Spirit we may be powerfully supported and enabled to stand in the hour of temptation; or when fallen, raised again and recovered out of it, and have a sanctified use and improvement thereof: that our sanctification and salvation may be perfected, Satan trodden under our feet, and we fully freed from sin, temptation, and all evil, for ever.
We live in a fallen world. We will experience in one form or another the ravages of sin and its real consequences. These can appear both on our own body in illness, injury, or incapacitation or spiritually when it comes to temptation, melancholy, demonic attacks, or other ways that the Devil seeks to destroy the people of God. The promise is not that the Lord’s anointed will never experience these things, but that we by virtue of the presence of the Holy Spirit can say with Joseph that what the world meant for bad Jehovah has used for good. However, we are wrong if we think that the knowledge of these truths changes the effect of the corruptions we see and feel.
Part of the reason why we pray this petition is because we do suffer. We do sense in our depths the weight of these things. When the Psalmist cries out, “How long, O Lord?” it’s not a rhetorical device. David is full of lamentation. It’s okay for believers to recognize the incongruity of the power of God and our weakness in the flesh, as long as we remember what the man after God’s own heart says at the end of Psalm 13, “. . . But I have trusted in Your mercy; my heart shall rejoice in Your salvation. I will sing to the Lord, because He has dealt bountifully with me.”.
Again, this statement is not one focused on quantity. David is not saying, “God has given me more good days than bad days.”. What he is writing for our benefit is focused on the nature of the gift of the LORD vs. the anguish of sin and misery. Yes, the aching is temporary, but even then when Jesus cries out in pain at the cross it is the statement of Psalm 22 “You have answered Me” which enables Christ to die in peace. He heard once more the assurant love of God for Him in the fact, “For He has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted”. The presence of the Triune is what enables us to deal rightly with what the catechism question above refers to as the situation in life when sin and its evil are at the door, “. . . ready powerfully to draw us aside, and ensnare us.”. How can we stand strong in the midst of this? Because of Jesus, because of the promise of God fulfilled in every generation of the faithful.
That is our hope in time of trouble.
In closing, of the many things I love about the Catechism is that it does not exist in some high world of theology untouched by reality. We are sinners who sin, who are going to sin, and will sin again until either we die or Christ returns in the flesh. Believers understand that the mere existence of sin does not give us license to sin. Romans 6:1-2. However, as Q.195 helpfully reminds us, “ . . . or when fallen, raised again and recovered out of it, and have a sanctified use and improvement thereof.” This means that our expectation in praying this petition is that God will deliver us from our own bad decisions out of His marvelous grace, and each time He pulls us out of the mire our response is to be worship and thanksgiving, and growth in sanctification. We who are redeemed beings should learn, and improve for the future, but only by God’s grace.
A Last Word:
https://www.ligonier.org/podcasts/ultimately-with-rc-sproul/the-christians-anchor-amid-suffering
Blessings in Christ,
Rev. Benjamin Glaser
Pastor, Bethany ARP Church