TV Program

Current Episode

Defeating Temptation

SERIES: Anatomy of Sin #4 of 8

2009-08-23

PRODUCTION #: 1074

SPEAKER: Shawn Boonstra

Have you ever wondered what it is about temptation that makes it so, well, irresistible? I mean, most of the time, if we really stopped to think about our sins before we committed them, we'd find a lot of reasons not to do it. And still, for some reason, even though we know it's going to land us in a lot of trouble, we do it anyway.

For example, perhaps you are faced with the temptation to embezzle funds from a long-forgotten account at work. You know full well that no amount of jail time is worth that little bit of money, but still, for some reason, you find yourself moving things around and doctoring the figures just enough to make the money disappear into your pocket.

We know that if we commit adultery, it's likely going to destroy our marriage, and we know that the devastation of that sin far outweighs any pleasure we are going to get out of it. And still, for some reason, every day people go ahead and still do it.

I read the story a little while ago of a man who was in the mall with his wife, when he noticed a beautiful young lady walking by. He not only let his eyes linger on her frame, but he actually turned his head to follow her as she walked by. When he finally turned around again, thinking his wife hadn't noticed, she said, "I sure hope she was worth the trouble you're in!"

Common sense would tell you that it's never a good idea to do the wrong thing, but something else keeps urging us on, in spite of our better judgment, trying to get us to stray off the narrow path.

Now in the old days, they used to picture temptation as two little cartoon figures sitting on your shoulder, one of them an angel, and the other one a devil. The angel keeps pleading with you, in one ear, to do the right thing; and the devil keeps pulling you in the other direction, trying to get you to go the other way. And of course, we laugh, because we can all identify with the struggle, and we know that Hollywood is probably going to have the character do the wrong thing and give us a lot of great entertainment.

What's not so funny about it, though, is the reality of it. Oh, I'm not suggesting that angels and devils actually take up a perch on your shoulder every time you feel the urge to do something sinful, but the struggle you go through is very real. In fact, no less a luminary than the Apostle Paul noticed the struggle in his own life.

Here is what he says in Romans, chapter seven (Romans 7:22-23):

"For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members."

The struggle was very real for this man. On the one hand, he wanted to do what was right, and devote his life to God; but on the other hand, his old nature was always there, trying to lure him back into his old sinful habits. And sometimes, even when his heart was telling him that what he was doing was wrong, he still caved in and did it anyway.

Does it sound familiar? If it doesn't, you haven't been living on planet Earth. It's something we all struggle with. To this day, I find moments in my life that I'm not exactly proud of. 

Let me give you an example. I remember a time that I sent for a package from a neighboring town, because I was planning a big baptismal service for a number of brand-new Christians, and I didn't have enough baptismal robes to go around. So, I called another church and arranged to borrow some, and they agreed to put them on the bus to me that very morning so that I would have them for the service the next day.

Well, wouldn't you know it, the package never arrived. I called my friends in the next town, and they assured me that the package had been put on the bus, and so I went down to the bus station to see if I could figure out what had happened.

"Listen," I said, "I put a package on the bus just one town over, and it wasn't on the bus when it got here. Do you have any idea where it might have gone?"

Well, the clerk behind the counter couldn't have cared less whether or not I got my package and told me that I could check back again in a couple of days if I felt like it. When I explained that it was an emergency, and asked if there was some way we could trace it, he just moved on to something else.

That's when I felt my old nature rising to the surface. I knew that it was impossible to lose that package when it had definitely been put on the bus, and the town was only an hour away with no stops in between. But what really made me mad was the fact this employee, who wasn't very busy, just didn't care.

Now, as my temper was flaring and I felt the temperature under my collar rising, I knew full well what the Bible said about keeping your angry words to yourself.

I knew that in Proverbs 15, verse one, it is written (Proverbs 15:1):

"A soft answer turneth away wrath, but grievous words stir up anger."

And I also knew that losing my cool with this guy probably wasn't going to accomplish very much, but I did it anyway; and the whole time I was reaming him out, I knew it was the wrong thing to do.

So, you can imagine how I felt when my package arrived that evening with the name of my church written all over the side of it. And you know, it was the same clerk who handed it to me, and he still hadn't gotten over his verbal spanking. You know, even though I apologized profusely for the way I handled things, the only thing he's likely to remember about me or my church is the way I chewed him out.

So, let me ask you, why do we do it? When we know that it's absolutely the wrong thing to do, why do we cave in? Is there really a force at work trying to lure us into sin? Is it possible that evil angels really do whisper things in our ears? It's not only possible, the Bible tells us that it's absolutely true. Just think back to the first temptation in the Garden of Eden, where Lucifer convinced Eve to go against a direct command of God.

Now, Eve was completely responsible for her actions, but the idea didn't just kind of pop up in her mind. The Bible says that the devil assumed the form of a serpent and talked her into it.

"Listen," he said, "did God really say that you can't eat from all the trees in the garden?"

"Oh no," said Eve, "we can eat from all of them except one. It's just that one tree in the middle of the garden. God says if we eat from that one, we are going to die."

"Oh nonsense," said the great deceiver. "You are not really going to die if you eat from that tree. God knows that if you eat that fruit, you are going to become like Him, knowing good from evil. He's just holding out on you."

Now, that's kind of my own paraphrase of the story found in Genesis chapter three, but that's essentially what happened; and what I want you to notice is how the devil worked, because for the most part, he hasn't changed his style a whole lot. The first thing he did was to sow a little doubt in Eve's mind.

"Hey Eve," he said, "did God really say that?"

You see, the devil knew that he wasn't going to be able to just walk up to Adam and Eve and order them to eat forbidden fruit. They had heard from God Himself that they weren't supposed to do that, so it wasn't going to work. But if he could make them doubt the words of God, if he could make them wonder if God really meant what they thought He said, then he might just have a chance.

And to this day, one of the devil's best tools is to simply twist the Word of God enough to make you wonder if your particular sin might not be what God is talking about. Let me give you an example. I've had a number of young men approach me to talk about the issue of being intimate with their girlfriends.

"Listen pastor, there's nowhere in the Bible that says we can't be together before we're married. What the Bible is talking about is adultery, the sin of cheating on your spouse or helping somebody else cheat on their spouse. But we are two loving, consenting adults, and there's nothing wrong with that!"

Now of course, they are really just echoing the sentiments of modern society, but they've also taken the Word of God out of context and they are essentially questioning something that God has said.

On the one hand, they are quite right. The sin of adultery seems to have more to do with married life, but they are also ignoring what the Bible says about fornication, which is a word used to describe all illicit relationships.

What I've discovered is that most of these young men already have a profound sense of discomfort, and that's why they bring the question to me in the first place. In their hearts, they know it's wrong, but they cruise through the Bible, looking for some way that it might not apply to their situation; and once you venture into that territory, you open yourself up to the same kind of temptations that Adam and Eve faced. The devil's first trick was to make us doubt the Word of God, and he's still busy trying to help us find loopholes in it today.

But still, it doesn't really answer the question, does it? Why is it that we do what we know is wrong? Why are some of the temptations we face in life so unbelievably strong?

Well, for the answer to that, let's dissect the nature of temptation just a little bit.
There's an interesting passage found in the book of First John that essentially boils down temptation into three general areas.

Listen carefully as John explains how the devil works. In First John, chapter two, he commends a group of young men for "overcoming the wicked one," and then he explains exactly how that's done (1 John 2:15-17):

"Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever."

Now, I hope you caught it. John gives us three general areas of temptation. First of all, he mentions the "lust of the flesh," which has to do with our appetite. Secondly, he mentions the "lust of the eyes," which has a lot to do with our senses and our mind. And finally, he mentions the mother of all sins, the very sin that caused Lucifer to fall from grace himself, "the pride of life."

If the devil's going to work on you, he's going to work on you in one of these three areas. Let's take a look at it in the context of Adam and Eve's situation, and you'll see what I mean.

When the devil first approached Eve, he appealed to her sense of appetite. There were a lot of other things, I'm sure, that Satan could have used to try and incite rebellion in our first parents, because God's law is much bigger than one simple tree, but he chose quite deliberately, to work in this one specific area.

"Take a look at that fruit, Eve. Do you mean to say that you can try every other tree in the garden, but you"ll never know what this stuff tastes like?"

It was an appeal to appetite, and to this day, we still use the term "forbidden fruit" to describe anything we really want to indulge in, but we know we shouldn't.

Junk food merchants use it to get us to eat something we know is going to clog our arteries. Pornographers use it to get young men to watch things that will ruin their moral sensibilities. It's an appeal to appetite. It's an appeal to that part of us that doesn't want to miss out on something that might be fun.

But that's not where the devil stopped, because he knew it was going to take more than some shiny fruit to pull down our first parents. Today, an appeal to appetite is usually enough, because we've been weakened by thousands of years of habitual caving in. But back then, it was going to take a little bit more. So, Satan appealed to a sense of pride:

"Hey, listen, Eve. God's not really being up front with you. He says that if you eat that fruit, you are going to die, but truth is that you will become more like Him. And really, you are far too important to stay down there at that level, aren't you? You can be just like God!"

And when pride was mingled with appetite, the job was finished. It was more than we could handle, and the human race fell into a miserable existence of sin and suffering, but the fact remains that Adam and Eve could have resisted. They didn't have to disobey God. Their sin was the result of entertaining the devil's suggestions, and allowing them to grow in their minds.

Take a look at the things that make you fall the most often. You might even want to write them on a piece of paper so you can see them in all their stark reality. I think you are going to discover that all of them fall into one of those three categories: the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life.

The "lust of the flesh" is an appeal to your appetite. This is where a lot of things like gluttony, drunkenness and sexual sin find their roots. Now admittedly, sometimes things like substance abuse have a lot to do with masking the pain that comes with real life, but the roots, essentially, are found in the "lust of the flesh." That's how the devil gets a lot of people to step over the line.

The "lust of the eyes" is closely related, but different on a number of levels. Today, we refer to attractive things as "eye-candy," which is one way of saying that our senses are also appetites that need feeding. But there's more to the "lust of the eyes" than mere appetite.

Your five senses are the avenues by which information is moved to your brain, and when we permit the wrong information to be lodged in our cranial filing cabinets, we are setting ourselves up for a moral disaster.

Here's how it works. You allow yourself to regularly listen to things you know aren't true, or watch movies and television programs with a message that clearly contradicts the Word of God. Studies have shown, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that every word and every image that goes into your brain is there to stay. Then, when you are faced with a moral dilemma, you dip into the old filing cabinet to find information to help you make a decision, and if the filing cabinet is full of the wrong stuff, you make the wrong decision.

We need to keep asking ourselves if the activities we allow ourselves to engage in are desensitizing us to sin. Do the things that used to shock us seem kind of mundane now? How much bad information have we stored away to make that happen?

When a young man watches thousands of hours of violent movies, for example, he fills the cabinet with really poor information on how to handle an interpersonal conflict, and his first gut reaction is to resort to violence. So the solution, of course, is to fill your mental filing cabinet with the right information, which is one reason it's so important to spend time studying the Word of God.

The last area of temptation is the "pride of life," and this is really where every other sin begins, because when you sin, you're placing a higher priority on yourself than anybody else. Something tells us that we have a right to material prosperity, and we steal. Something tells us that our agenda is more important than someone else's life, and we murder.

Sin is always the result of placing yourself on a higher pedestal than anybody else, and if you really want to get down to brass tacks, it comes down to valuing your own wishes more than God's. It's the very sin that led to Lucifer's downfall. Isaiah tells us that he wanted to sit on God's throne. He wanted to be more important than God Himself.

And of course, we are very good as human beings at feeding that kind of pride, particularly in North America where it's easy to imagine that we are very important. And the whole time, we are busy feeding our sense of self-importance.
But the minute we expose the devil's tools, we stand a real fighting chance of overcoming temptation. When you realize that he's working in these three basic areas, the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life, it gives you an opportunity to stop feeding these things. It gives you a chance to run to Jesus and have Him fill your heart with the right things.

And when you do that, you are going to find that the appeal of sin becomes weaker and weaker, because you are not feeding that old nature any more. As a matter of fact, as you spend time with Jesus, you are going to find that you actually become more like Him, and the Bible says that He was successful over temptation at every turn.

Let me ask you a question: Do you find yourself continually caving into something? Do you find that you just don't seem to have the power to resist? Then take a close look at your life and figure out where the devil has been feeding your sinful nature. Analyze what it is that you keep on doing over and over again. Where are you when you do it? What circumstances precipitate that sin every single time you commit it?

I think you'll find some interesting patterns, and the thing you need to do is pray about it. Take that sin to Jesus and tell Him what's going on. Show Him what you've discovered and ask Him to show you even more. I think you are going to be surprised at how the Holy Spirit of God will start to tell you exactly where the devil's been working you over. He'll start to show you your weakest spots, and then, with His strength in your life, He'll give you a way out.

In the Book of Hebrews, there is a passage that talks about what you should do with irresistible temptation. Listen to this (Hebrews 4:14-16): 

"Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin."

Did you notice what it said? When Jesus was here, He was tempted, too. In another program, we'll take a close look at that, but for now, I just want you to notice that He understands what it's like to live here, and the big difference is that He never caved in. He never sinned, not even once.

You can go to all the self-help experts you want, but none of them has the expertise of Jesus. As helpful as some are, not one of them knows what it's like to overcome temptation every single time. But the Bible says that you have access to someone who does, and He's practically begging you to come for help.

Listen to what it says in the very next verse (Hebrews 4:16):

"Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need."

Listen, there is real hope for you. I've had people write me to tell me that their case is hopeless. But the Bible firmly disagrees. You don't have to be a slave to sin. You have a high priest who not only paid the penalty for that sin and offers your forgiveness, but He invites you to step boldly into the throne room of heaven to ask for help in overcoming it; and with every temptation, God says, there is also a way out.

You know, I'm glad God offers us as much information as He does in the Bible about temptation and sin. One of the things that quickly disarms an enemy is when you expose his methods, and that's exactly what the Bible does.

I'd like to pray with you today about the struggles that you are facing, so why don't we bow our heads together.

PRAYER:
Heavenly Father, we are thankful that you've pointed out to us the areas the devil works in our hearts. Today, we want to ask you, we want to come into the throne room of grace boldly and ask that you give us strength to resist, and that we would understand what temptation is and how to deal with it. And that we would learn to lean on Jesus Christ, knowing that he grants us the power to overcome. Lord, draw us closer to you. Teach us to lean on Jesus. For we ask it in His precious name, amen.

 

Scriptures for Show #1074 DEFEATING TEMPTATION

"For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members."
—Romans 7:22-23

"A soft answer turneth away wrath, but grievous words stir up anger."
—Proverbs 15:1

"Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever."
—1 John 2:15-17

"Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need."
— Hebrews 4:14-16

Scriptures Used in “Defeating Temptation”