Change Your Life - Know Your Temptation
- Paul Downie
- 2 hours ago
- 23 min read
Introduction
Hebrews 12:1-3 NIV
[1] Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, [2] fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. [3] Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
Singapore is known as ‘A Fine City’. And not without reason. All over their public transport and in many of their buildings there are clear signs telling you about things they consider as misdemeanours, for which you will receive a fine if you commit them. They will not hesitate to levy those fines. That is why Singaporeans are very disciplined and their city is scrupulously clean.
You look at those signs and you know precisely what to do – or not to do.
Some Bible teaching is not like this. I have often sat through sermons, reached the end, and, even if I’ve taken notes, wondered what the message was and what I should do about it. I find is slightly amusing that Peter found himself in the same position – even after preaching a quite brilliant, Spirit-led, theology-soaked sermon, we still see this question:
Acts 2:37 NIV
[37] When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?”
The application wasn’t clear. They didn’t know what they should do next.
If you’ve been reading my posts since the New Year, you’ll have seen that we have covered a lot of big, serious subjects: our feeling that we are beyond redemption in ‘Too Far Gone’; why godless religion causes harm in ‘Broken by Religion’; how Jesus satisfies the deepest longing of the human heart in ‘Are You Thirsty?’, and my series looking at what Jesus suffered on our behalf in ‘Man of Sorrows’.
But maybe you're wondering, like those first century Jews, what you should do next? How should these teachings be applied?
Peter gave those first century Jews a swift answer:
Acts 2:38-39 NIV
[38] Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. [39] The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.”
They should repent – that is, turn away from their old life – and believe the good news. There is a level of dependency here: if you believe the good news, then you will repent; you will let go of one and grasp the other.
For some of us, that repentance comes easy. They see the horror and the ugliness of our sin and they don’t want to do it anymore. They lose the taste for it right away.
For others, it’s a daily battle. Like an addiction. Every day they feel like an addict. Every day they need to escape the temptation to escape that next fix.
The reality is that we are all sinners. As Paul taught the Romans:
Romans 3:22-24 NIV
[22] This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, [23] for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, [24] and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
But as Paul also taught, that sin is not necessarily in the past – even for him it was a daily battle (Romans 7).
As Christians, it does us no good at all to pretend that we don’t face this battle, or to claim that we ourselves have won victory over it. As John taught:
1 John 1:8-10 NIV
[8] If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. [9] If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. [10] If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.
So every one of us is a sinner on the mend. Every one of us faces a battle to move from sin as close as we can to sanctity, knowing full well that we will never get there before we reach Heaven.
But nonetheless, we are called to try. We are called to do this:
Philippians 2:12-13 NIV
[12] Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, [13] for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.
That attempt to constantly turn away from sin and towards sanctity, to work out what God has worked in, is repentance. Christians are not called to repent once and that’s it over with. This is not a ‘one and done’ scenario.
No, we should live in a permanent state of repentance. We should repent from every sin we discover in our lives. And since we are not perfect, there will always be sins of which we should repent.
The process of finding sin in our lives and repenting of it is basically what discipleship is all about. It’s about growing through repentance.
Over the next ten weeks, twice a week, I will be posting studies to help us with this.
The first set of studies is a shorter series called ‘Change Your Life’. This is all about what we should do when we realise we have committed a sin and don’t want to commit the same sin again.
The second set of studies is a longer set, based on the book of Nehemiah, called ‘Rebuild Your Life’. This is all about what we should do if sin has caused damage to our life and our relationships: how we should slowly rebuild our life and strengthen our resolve and our character so we don’t make the same mistakes again.
As I said earlier, we are all sinners. We are all in this together. One of us is not better than the other.
My hope is that we will all be blessed as we join together on this journey towards holiness.
Let’s start, then, with the first post on the ‘Change Your Life’ series, which is entitled Know Your Temptation.
Know Your Temptation
Mark 9:43, 45, 47-48 NIV
[43] If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life maimed than with two hands to go into hell, where the fire never goes out.
[45] And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than to have two feet and be thrown into hell.
[47] And if your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell, [48] where “ ‘the worms that eat them do not die, and the fire is not quenched.’
Part of my ‘day’ job is overseeing the resolution of serious IT issues, and the investigation of what went wrong to ensure they don’t happen again.
It’s not as easy as it sounds.
Often professional reputations, career prospects, egos and commercial relationships mean that you might know what happened, but the truth may never appear in a report. Even if it does, there is often an unwillingness to admit fault or seek to make things better.
Personal growth can often be like that – in particular growth in holiness. It demands that we are ruthlessly open with ourselves above all, as Jesus taught in this passage, and seek to remove everything in our lives that holds us back.
As we saw earlier, the writer to the Hebrews used a different, less radical analogy: that of an athlete.
Hebrews 12:1 NIV
[1] Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.
These referred to two particular aspects of athletes in the first century.
Firstly, the athletes would train with weights to strengthen their muscles. When the race came, they would shed these weights so they could run faster.
Secondly, they ran naked. While they should be glad that TV hadn’t been invented yet because it would really have impeded any chance of their events being shown live, the aim was to shed from them anything that could trip them up or weigh them down as they ran.
Ancient togas were quite beautiful and very formal, but lacked aerodynamics and would absolutely cause them to stumble and fall, so they had to go.
Hence the talk of shedding things that entangle.
They had an absolute commitment to performance and winning the race.
Paul said this about the Christian life:
Philippians 3:13-14 NIV
[13] Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, [14] I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
1 Corinthians 9:24-25 NIV
[24] Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. [25] Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.
But what does this mean for us? How do we run to win?
This is where Jesus’ teaching comes in. It provides us with three areas of our life where we should review and check to see if they are sources of temptation for us.
But first we must understand what it is that we are tempted to do – what are the sins we could be involved in that entangle us, weigh us down and prevent us from running the race as we should.
The New Testament, rather helpfully, has some lists:
Galatians 5:19-21 NIV
[19] The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; [20] idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions [21] and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.
Ephesians 4:17-21 NIV
[17] So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. [18] They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. [19] Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed. [20] That, however, is not the way of life you learned [21] when you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus.
However, the whole law can be summed up in just two commands:
Matthew 22:35-40 NIV
[35] One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: [36] “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” [37] Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ [38] This is the first and greatest commandment. [39] And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ [40] All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
We break the entire law – not just a few minor commandments – when we fail to love God, our neighbour or ourselves, because the entire cannon of law is simply a commentary on these two commands. As soon as we act in hatred or loathing or disdain or disrespect towards any of these three, we are sinning, regardless of what the details of the law say.
That is how we know when we have given in to temptation.
You can see, then, that the bar is set really high.
You can see, then, why it is that what we are looking at now is not just relevant to drug addicts or alcoholics or anyone else with a dependent psychology.
No, it is relevant for everyone.
The first area of our life where we should watch out for temptation is The Things We Do.
The Things We Do
Mark 9:43 NIV
[43] If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life maimed than with two hands to go into hell, where the fire never goes out.
When I was approaching my teenage years, my mother used to frequent bars with her friends. They weren’t drinking. They were there with the Salvation Army, collecting money for the poor and sharing the Gospel with the people there.
Their purpose was good.
But someone with an alcohol problem could not do that work.
I had several relatives who attended church regularly and were professing Christians. One of them loved to play card and board games. But he was very competitive and a horrible cheater.
I’ve known people who made a big show of their Christianity. But take them into a sports stadium and they become another person altogether.
I’ve seen apparently godly Christians go on social media and become nasty, provocative, argumentative, jealous people.
Sometimes the things we do change us. We don’t want to become bad people. Not at all.
But put us in certain situations and we morph into someone we do not want to be.
We excuse it. We say that other people are like that. We say we are just trying to fit in. We say it's our outlet, that we’re just letting off steam.
But it’s not okay.
Not one bit.
We cannot be one person in one setting, and another in another. We cannot play the field.
God will not tolerate that.
The Israelites were very good at it. But God exposed their idolatry in one seeking statement from Elijah:
1 Kings 18:21 NIV
[21] Elijah went before the people and said, “How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.” But the people said nothing.
Jesus’ surgery for us in those situations is hard and it is radical: cut it off. Amputate it. If there are things you do that do not honour God, then do not do them. Simple.
And don’t care what other people think of you. If they can do them without morphing into someone who does not honour God, that’s okay for them.
But it’s not okay for you.
Paul taught this:
1 Corinthians 10:23 NIV
[23] “I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right to do anything”—but not everything is constructive.
Romans 14:1-9 NIV
[1] Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters. [2] One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. [3] The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them. [4] Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To their own master, servants stand or fall. And they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand. [5] One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind. [6] Whoever regards one day as special does so to the Lord. Whoever eats meat does so to the Lord, for they give thanks to God; and whoever abstains does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God. [7] For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. [8] If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. [9] For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living.
When we choose to not do something because it is not right for us or because it causes issues for our conscience then we have every right to make that choice and those who are around us have the responsibility to accept it.
I, for example, do not drink alcohol. Other Christians do. I have the responsibility to accept them. They have the responsibility to accept me. That’s how it works.
The main thing is that we cut ourselves off from anything we do that could potentially cause us to drift away from God or to do something that does not glorify Him.
But it’s not just the things we do that can be a problem, it’s also The Places We Go.
The Places We Go
Mark 9:45 NIV
[45] And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than to have two feet and be thrown into hell.
I once walked into a casino, gambled with money that wasn’t mine and walked out with winnings.
You might think that is utterly incongruous for a Christian, particularly a former missionary and Bible blogger, but let me explain.
We were on a cruise ship. We had participated in a free prize draw and won some vouchers. Among those vouchers was some casino credit, which could not be exchanged for anything else. So we headed to the casino, exchanged the voucher for tokens, stationed ourselves in front of a one-armed bandit and played until the tokens from the credit ran out.
We were up. We had won more than we had staked. So I stopped. We exchanged our winnings for cash and left the casino.
My wife was a little confused. She asked why I had stopped when we were winning.
My reply was that we should stop because we were winning. There was no risk to us while we were playing with their money, but there was a risk to us if we started playing with our money. At that point it really was gambling. I was not prepared to do it.
Besides, we had winnings. We were up. And that’s where you stop.
I’m fully aware that there are many, many people who cannot do this. There are far too many people who enter a casino and leave having lost fortunes.
Gambling to me is profoundly unethical. It makes money from addiction and foolish dreams of easy money. To me, it’s poor stewardship of God-given resources and basically handing money over to highly exploitative companies
But I know there are Christians who like the thrill of the odd ‘flutter’ on horses or football.
Now, it’s here that legalist Christians extend this verse to mean something different than it does. They say that every Christian should avoid places of temptation, like bars, restaurants, pubs, cinemas, nightclubs, betting shops, sports stadia, casinos, theatres and the like.
The verse doesn’t say that. And for very good reason:
These places did not exist yet because they had not been invented yet.
Those prohibitions are utterly meaningless now anyway. Thanks to the internet, the immoral temptations that these locations once represented for some are not just ‘out there’. They are instead on tiny devices that we carry around in our pockets and we can access them anytime.
The reality is that some Christians can go into these types of places without being in the least bit tempted. They can also minister in them for the Gospel too.
But not everyone can.
There are also places where most Christians – in fact, most people in the world – would believe that it isn’t proper for decent, right thinking people to go, such as brothels, strip clubs and drug dens, but there are highly trained and skilled missionaries who work there.
So let’s be mature and sensible here.
Paul the Apostle walked right through a whole load of idols in Athens (Acts 17:16). They troubled him, but they did not tempt him. I’ve also been in mosques and Buddhist temples. I admire them for their architecture, and often their gardens. I respect their culture and seek to learn about it.
But I am not tempted by it.
Other people would be tempted and cannot do it.
Jesus is our pattern in this. He was heavily criticised for the places he went and the company He kept (Matthew 11:16-19; Luke 7:31-35). The religious elite hated it.
But He was clearly not tempted by it.
However, some people are.
And we have to respect that.
Romans 14:1 NIV
[1] Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters.
Romans 14:13-14 NIV
[13] Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in the way of a brother or sister. [14] I am convinced, being fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for that person it is unclean.
Romans 15:1-2 NIV
[1] We who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak and not to please ourselves. [2] Each of us should please our neighbors for their good, to build them up.
If you are in this position, if there are places you cannot go to because if you go there you know you will be tempted to do things that do not glorify God, then do not go there. Know that you have the right for your opinion to be respected. You don’t have the right to impose it on others, but you do have the right for it to be respected.
Your conscience and your walk with God are more important than anything that might happen in that place. Cut yourself off from it. Pull out. Pull back.
You will not regret it.
But if you can and do go into such dark places without feeling in the slightest bit tempted to participate in sinful and unproductive acts, good for you!
Just don’t look down on those who cannot.
They are doing the right thing by deciding not to go.
But, as Jesus said, it’s not just a case of the things we do and the places we go, but also The Things We See.
The Things We See
Mark 9:47-48 NIV
[47] And if your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell, [48] where “ ‘the worms that eat them do not die, and the fire is not quenched.’
In 1998, while I was in missionary training, a bunch of us did something many Christians would not be happy about. We went to the cinema in České Budějovice to see a new film that had come out. It was a certificate ‘15’. The first twenty-five minutes of this film were known to be so violent that war veterans had burst into tears and become traumatised.
But there we were, trainee missionaries, with our tutors, watching ‘Saving Private Ryan’.
It’s really a very good movie. It covers the cost of war and the acts of self-sacrifice that take place within it and does a very good job of it. It’s violent because it needs to be. It’s not at all gratuitous.
Many Christians judge the movies they should watch by the certificates issued by their government’s censors. So if it’s the equivalent of a ‘U’ or a ‘PG’ then it’s okay. Anything more than that, and it’s not.
I don’t see that anywhere in the Bible.
There are many movies with necessarily high age certificates and necessarily violent or edgy content that it is good for Christians to see – provided they are age and maturity appropriate. Movies like ‘Schindler’s List’, ‘Dead Man Walking’, ‘John Q’, ‘The Accused’, ‘The Killing Fields’ all give us an insight into serious topics that our culture is discussing and help us to understand them, even though we will be confronted with very difficult material on the screen.
Alternatively, recently even the BBC has produced children’s TV content that promotes a worldview which I, as the former parent of a young child, would not have allowed my daughter to watch.
Film certifications are just not a good indicator of whether or not we should watch a movie.
But we should take the utmost care over what we watch.
It goes without saying that there are some things a Christian should not watch. Porn being the top. Christians should not participate in the porn industry in an way, shape or form. It is universally harmful. It is horrifically degrading. Watching it is very damaging on multiple levels.
Don’t be fooled: there is no such thing as ‘ethical porn’.
Just stay away from it.
But here’s the thing: the same principles that are used to bait people into looking at porn are also used in social media and advertising.
We recently started a travel site, where we shared advice and photographs of where we had been. It’s simply astonishing how many so-called ‘travel bloggers’ are not selling travel information, but are selling themselves. They may be physically present in some of the most beautiful locations in the world, but are simply there so they can cavort around half-clothed to reel in adoring fans and make money from them, not so they can show off the destination.
So-called ‘thirst traps’ – scantily clad photos of mostly women, but sometimes men – are all over social media.
But advertising in general is built on the same principle: the idea that people can be enticed through what they see to spend money. Every bit of it is to provide us with an incentive to violate the Tenth Commandment:
Exodus 20:17 NIV
[17] “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
It is designed to do the same job as the serpent did in the Garden of Eden: to present something as desirable so we want it, even if we should not have it (Genesis 3:1).
Fundamentally, it is designed to tell us that we do not have all we need (Psalm 23:1), that God has deprived us of something good and that we should spend our money to get it for ourselves.
Taking care of the things we see is not just about avoiding dirty movies or porn, it’s about keeping ourselves away from things that are trying to keep us away from God.
And it’s so difficult, isn’t it? These days we are absolutely assaulted with advertising and sexually provocative imagery. Much of what used to be restricted to top shelf magazines, or the inside pages of certain newspapers, or even cinemas or end of the pier shows, is now in free circulation, accessible in a fraction of a second from our phones.
How can we cut ourselves off from it? It just doesn’t seem practical!
But it is!
There are many things that the Bible lists as dangerous if we gaze at them or linger at them for too long. Here are a few:
Genesis 3:6 NIV
[6] When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.
Proverbs 23:31-35 NIV
[31] Do not gaze at wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup, when it goes down smoothly! [32] In the end it bites like a snake and poisons like a viper. [33] Your eyes will see strange sights, and your mind will imagine confusing things. [34] You will be like one sleeping on the high seas, lying on top of the rigging. [35] “They hit me,” you will say, “but I’m not hurt! They beat me, but I don’t feel it! When will I wake up so I can find another drink?”
Proverbs 7:21-25 NIV
[21] With persuasive words she led him astray; she seduced him with her smooth talk. [22] All at once he followed her like an ox going to the slaughter, like a deer stepping into a noose [23] till an arrow pierces his liver, like a bird darting into a snare, little knowing it will cost him his life. [24] Now then, my sons, listen to me; pay attention to what I say. [25] Do not let your heart turn to her ways or stray into her paths.
The secret to escaping these deadly snares comes in a surprising place, in a verse that seems to be without hope:
James 1:13-15 NIV
[13] When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; [14] but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. [15] Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.
James states that temptation is a process, a process that leads to a sticky end. But there is always a way out of this process:
1 Corinthians 10:13 NIV
[13] No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.
What we need to do is find it.
Or better still, make one ourselves.
I came across some advice online that really works for me.
Say you're facing a temptation to do something you know is wrong, likely sparked by something you have seen. Try these three steps:
Stop looking. Turn away from it.
Start praying. But when you’re praying, don’t mention the specifics of the temptation over and over again – that will just tempt you all over again. Just pray quickly, ‘Lord Jesus, I’m really tempted to do this thing and I don’t want to. Help me. Amen.’ Then leave it at that.
Pause for 15 minutes. Take your mind off the temptation. Think about something else. Do something else. Just back off and leave it.
After those fifteen minutes, you will lose the desire to give in because it will go.
Those images will flash onto your retina. They are almost inescapable.
But you don’t have to dwell on them. You don’t have to think about them. Just let them go and think about something else.
Philippians 4:8 NIV
[8] Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.
That is the key to breaking any visual temptation or addiction.
And we have to take this seriously, because other people are watching. The people who are watching are often younger, less understanding, more vulnerable. We must stand up to temptation at all costs because we must not do anything to make them fall. Not after Jesus gave us this warning:
Mark 9:42 NIV
[42] “If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them if a large millstone were hung around their neck and they were thrown into the sea.
Not only our spiritual lives are at risk, but those of other people.
It’s time to stand up to sources of temptation and make that cut.
Too much depends on it.
Conclusion
Psalms 119:9-11 NIV
[9] How can a young person stay on the path of purity? By living according to your word. [10] I seek you with all my heart; do not let me stray from your commands. [11] I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.
I am a big fan of good quality buffets. In fact, they are probably a contributory factor in the growth of my girth over the past twenty years.
But not everyone can eat everything at a buffet.
Some people have food allergies or intolerances. Others are diabetic. Others have health conditions that mean they have to watch their diet.
These people have to be careful. The cost of eating something that looks enticing could be a reaction that could end their life.
Temptations are a little bit like that. The temptation process is common to all people. The specific details may not be: what tempts you may not tempt me.
However, the Genesis 3 / Matthew 4 / Luke 4 mechanics are all the same, with one exception: satan himself had to intervene with Jesus, whereas on most occasions, our inward desires are what does the tempting, according to James 1:13-15.
But how do we break its hold?
We need to realise that Jesus has provided the way out (Romans 7:25). He provides us with the strength to say ‘No’.
But He also provides us with the command to say ‘No!’. That command is that when something we do or somewhere we go or something we see is tempting us, we should quite literally cut and run.
However, where we cut and how we cut are the issue.
We have a bush outside our kitchen window. Every spring time, we have to go outside and cut off the dead growth from winter so that new growth will not be threatened by the effort of maintaining dead branches. It’s a laborious task.
Now, there is one way to solve this at a stroke, at a single cut: slice into the trunk and cut the whole thing down. That will work. There will be no more dead branches that need to be pruned.
But there will also be no bush.
Our primary function as Christians is to take the Gospel to the ends of the earth. We cannot do that without taking our light into dark places. This means contact with temptation. It’s a hazard of the job.
We have to learn, therefore, how to handle it: where to cut so that our ministry produces fruit without jeopardising our walk with God and His glory in our life. That isn’t always easy or straightforward and neither is it the same for everyone.
But provided the motivation is not ‘What can I get away with?’ but ‘How can I glorify God?’, then we will not go too far wrong.
In my next post, we will look at who is actually responsible for our temptation, in a post entitled ‘Know Your Enemy’.
Prayer
Lord Jesus, You know me. You know everything about me. You made me. Help me to examine the things I do, the places I go and the things I see for any offensive way in me. Help me to cut off sources of temptation that cause me to fall. Amen.
Questions
What specific things that you do cause you to sin? How will you cut these off?
What specific places you go to cause you to sin? How will you cut these off?
What specific things you look at cause you to sin? How will you cut these off?
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