Determine to Meet with Him
Watch and Pray

Scripture Reading:  Matthew 6:9-15

Key Verse:  Matthew 26:41

“Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak.”

I may not know you personally, but I know at least one thing about you: You struggle with temptation!  No one is exempt from temptation.  The devil is no respecter of economic status, race or gender.  The evil one comes after everyone in order to destroy their lives.  Being tempted is no fun, it lures us into behaviors or words that we are later ashamed of.  Falling into temptation makes us feel like failures and hypocrites.  If you are in a cycle of falling into temptation, sorrow, and then repentance, you are not experiencing the abundant life Jesus died to give you!

            Jesus came to empower us and give us tools to gain victory over temptation.  We see an example of this in our printed key verse.  Jesus told His disciples to “watch and pray” so they did not fall into temptation.  If you had time to read the suggested scripture section, you read the Lord’s Prayer.  In this prayer, Jesus taught us to pray that we don’t fall into temptation.  It is clear that Jesus felt that we could win over temptation if we used the tools that He provided:  Prayer.

            Often when I am praying the Lord ’s Prayer, I change the words to pray: Grant me a rest from the test today!  I realize that there will be days that I must be tested, but I believe we have more days of testing than necessary because we don’t do what Jesus told us to do:  Pray for a rest from the test.

Father, if it be your will, please deliver me from the tests and temptations of the evil one today!  Thank you for victory in Jesus.  In His Name, Amen.