Temptation in Your Path of Duty
Temptation often comes right at the path of your duty. One way to escape it is to be prepared. Do not let temptations take you by surprise.
Temptation Arouses Curiosity
The moment you allow curiosity aroused by temptation to take the first bite; you are finished. The moment you think it is safe to step inside a lion’s cage to take a selfie; even your bones will not be recovered.
Say No When Temptation Knocks Loud and Persists
The longer temptation knocks at your door, the more bold you should be that you can overcome it. It is because you are still safely locked in. However great and furious the knock or pleading just say NO.
Temptation Often Comes Through Your Friends
Temptation has great power when it comes through your friends or colleagues. The possibility that they might reject you or make fun of you can unnerve you. It is good to be called names rather than to slip into a lifetime of misery and regret.
Temptation Leads to Sin by Your Second Glance
Temptation often defeats you when you stay a moment longer at spots you are not supposed to be. Run away. And do not look back for that second glance. Guard your eyes. Let it not look at evil and have your hearts hooked by what you see.
Temptation Tempts Because it Is Attractive
Temptation can come in many subtle and glamorous forms. Temptation that is not attractive; that when yielded to doesn’t have a tinge of pleasure in it; that does not give you at least a momentary satisfaction cannot be called temptation.
Temptation Is All About Instant Gratification
The danger about temptation is that it makes you think only of instant gratification and not about long-term and far reaching consequences, guilt, shame, remorse, ridicule and the burden of sin that you need to face or carry.
God Is Your Defence Against Temptation
Ultimately the only absolute defence against temptation that I know is God. Call out to him for help. A sincere heart prayer and cry from a broken and contrite heart is always heard and answered. King David says in Psalm 140, “You shield my head in the day of battle.” So run to God for protection against temptation.
Jesus Your Friend to Help You
The Bible speaks of Jesus as your high priest or in modern terms your faithful friend in heaven praying for you right when you are tempted. He understands your struggle as he too was tempted when he lived as a human being on earth. He never yielded to temptation. But because he resisted he knows its power and how you stumble.
“For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” *
So run to him. He will help you when temptation strikes. The only foolishness you should not commit is that don’t ever think that life will never bring you temptations. They will come when you least expect them.
God Does Not Tempt You Never Ever
And yet again, the Bible clearly tells us that God does not tempt anyone. Instead God’s Word shows us that it is the evil desires that is in our hearts that are the root cause of temptations tripping us.
“When tempted, no one should say, ‘God is tempting me.’ For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.”*
So leave the bait alone. Do not touch it. If you do, it is the evil desire within you that gets you hooked to the bait and then pulling you down. The end of its pleasure is death; not life.
*Bible quotes from: Hebrews 4;15, 16 and James 1: 13–15 New International Version 1984 Edition.
Read also: Create in Me a Clean Heart O God
Featured image Steve Buissinne from Pixabay | Pixir