“And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.” (Matthew 6:13). Jesus Christ teaches us that if we are to enter or even see the Kingdom of God, we must be born again. And how can we be born again unless we are first delivered? Being born again is not a one time event. If we are truly living the Gospel, we will be born again almost constantly. In essence, our lives look more or less something like this: we are born again as new creatures in Christ, we grow and learn and develop until we have reached our maximum potential, and then, the water breaks, our embryonic world collapses, that which supported and sustained us is no more, all has become evil, and we must be delivered from evil, a laborious and painful process, culminating finally in our rebirth, only for the cycle to start again. “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28). I don't think it's an accident that, in the context of being born again and delivered from evil, Christ uses words like labor and heavy-laden to describe this very birth-like process. Being delivered and then born again is no picnic, but we can't stay in embryonic development forever. Eventually we've got to be delivered so that we can learn and grow and then be delivered and born again once more. I know that when we have the opportunity to look back with hindsight, we will see clearly that all of the pain we endured in being delivered will have been worth it a thousand times over.
