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Amazing Facts

Temptation

Joe Crews

Temptation, Part 1

Every messy problem of immorality and all modern injustices stem from personal temptation.

Some people seem able to resist anything except temptation.

Yet it's now known that great good can result from the emotional urge to commit a wrong act.

I'll be back in a moment with the amazing facts.

Hello, this is Joe Cruz of the Amazing Facts broadcast, Facts Which Affect You.

Today we're concerned with the intriguing subject of temptation.

Never have I found an audience who is not interested in this problem in their spiritual lives.

There is no age when moral choices and struggles of the spirit are not brought clearly before us.

They may come on different levels of temptation, but it's always with us.

When I was a boy back in North Carolina, I remember that the neighborhood gang always started going through the orchards or heading for the orchards when the fruit was ripe.

You could always tell when it was ripe because the boys would make for it.

Now listen, friends, as long as the fruit of your life is immature and sour, the devil is not going to trouble you very much.

But when that fruit is ready and ripe, all the demons may come to attack and try to steal it away.

In a way, then, it's an honor for thieves to break into your home.

It shows at least that you have a reputation for having money.

When the devil comes around, it shows that you're becoming better off than you used to be, spiritually that is.

So count it all joy, therefore, when you're tempted.

The devil doesn't trouble those who are not spiritual.

It's the ones who are nearest to Christ who are most assailed.

And if you're a straggler out there on the edge of the battle, you're likely to come off with a whole skin even.

Now another reason temptation can be a good thing is that it implies moral insight.

It shows at least that you see a choice, that there's a contrast between black and white.

You know, friends, some people go through life seeing everything as a kind of dull gray.

But if there are no meaningful choices of good and evil, there can be no temptation.

In every moral situation, we see a choice and have the power of choosing.

The trouble with most of us moderns, I'm afraid, is that we have just an average little conscience and there's not any great moral struggle.

What a contrast that is to the temptations that Luther and Augustine faced and some of the other great characters of the past.

They knew what was right, friends, and they chose to do it.

There was no sad little whimper with those men.

Then you are to be congratulated if you are tempted.

Now, how shall we find the power to choose the right over the wrong?

I want to read a very important text now on this question in 1 Corinthians 10.

For there hath no temptation taken you, but such as is common to man.

But God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able, but will with the temptation also make a way of escape that ye may be able to bear it.

Now Paul here was talking to those who had to make choices every day.

Those Christians face the contrasting pagan and Christian worlds all around them.

And so Paul gave some very pointed counsel.

First of all, he said, when you're tempted, don't regard yourself as an exceptional case.

And all this subtle psychology that no 1 has ever faced the kind of temptations that we have to face is a vast delusion.

Sometimes people think, well, under ordinary circumstances we shouldn't steal or cheat, but business is business and everybody else is doing it.

And then concerning adultery, sometimes people reason this way, our problem is so unique, my friend never had a happy home and no 1 understands the pressures that he's under.

Every sin is prefaced with those 3 words.

But just remind yourself that this is old stuff.

It's no different from other temptations that other men have faced in the past.

You know, all the devil tried to do was convince Jesus out in that wilderness that he was different.

He said, command these stones to be turned into bread.

And then under his breath, no doubt, he said, others can't do it, but you're different, you can do it.

And then he took Jesus up to that high temple top, you remember, and said, cast yourself down.

Others can't do this, but you're God's darling, the rules don't apply to you, go ahead.

And then at last he said, bow down and worship me.

I know This is forbidden, but God will make an exception of you.

Think of the good you can do if my army is behind you." But Jesus met those subtle misquotations of the devil with the oldest words of Scripture.

He said, It is written, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.

He quoted the very things that Moses and Abraham and David and Isaiah had written long, long before.

He defeated the devil with the words of Scripture.

But now notice Paul goes further than this.

He says that God will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able to bear.

Now we need to remind ourselves that we'll never be alone in temptation.

God will never permit more to come than we are able to bear.

Well, somebody says, why does he allow any of it to come?

Listen, temptation provides opportunity for spiritual growth and conquest.

It's not a disgrace to be tempted, it's not a sin.

If there were no battles with temptation, there would be no signs of nobility.

There could be no growth without victory through strong decision.

You see, friends, virtue is tried innocence.

Untried goodness may be no goodness at all.

If you went into a cave somewhere and lived a good virtuous life and did no sin, it might be simply because you had no opportunity to do sin.

No, you must be tried and tested and tempted before true virtue appears.

By the way, it's sheer nonsense to say that bad people are the ones who have temptations and good people have none.

The only way we know people are good is because they reject temptation, and the only way we know bad people is because they give way to temptation.

If a person is never tempted at all, he may be just morally anemic.

He may not do any harm at all, but he might not do any good either, so he'd be just, I suppose, good for nothing.

Now, what did God mean when he said, a way of escape?

Does that mean there's an easy way out of temptation and that it will always be provided for us?

It simply means that in every moral trial, God will give you an alternative.

What Paul is saying is this, that every temptation to evil also is a temptation to some sort of good.

Temptation, Part 2

Some Hindu holy men of India spend years in isolated seclusion.

They believe that the absence of temptation will lead to virtuous conduct.

Others contend that untried innocence is no virtue at all.

I'll be back in a moment with the amazing facts about the benefits of temptation.

Hello this is Joe Cruz and the Amazing Facts broadcast, Facts Which Affect You.

Today we continue to study that intriguing subject of temptation.

Now here is an issue that No 1 can safely ignore.

Every living soul is going to be tempted until the very last day of life.

The form and appeal of it may change as age advances, but even the aged are sure to be tested by impulses to evil.

The great question, of course, is how we can gain the victory over those fearful assaults of Satan.

Is it humanly possible to overcome all temptation of sin?

Temptation always assails the mind, first of all.

Every sin originates in the mind and thoughts before it ever appears in the life of an individual.

In Mark 7, 21, Jesus said, For from within, out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts, etc., etc.

And then he goes on naming some of the sins of the flesh, and all of them begin with evil thoughts.

In Ephesians 2, verse 3, in the original language it says, "...the desires of the flesh, and the thoughts." Now please remember something.

The affections and propensities of our nature are not wrong in themselves either.

You see, God has put all manner of appetites and feelings within us, and they can be very beautiful and sacred.

Wrong comes in just 1 way, when desire oversteps the bounds and seeks gratification outside the will of God.

In other words, pictures, books, and words may come before us to excite the mind and appeal to the senses.

And they may present unholy desires to us, but we must not fulfill them.

The temptation to lust may be present, but we mustn't gratify it.

The evil thought may knock, but we must not open the door to receive it and hold it.

Desire will then become lust if we do that.

In James 1, 14, and 15 we have an example of that very thing.

James writes, For every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.

Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin, and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.

Now we can illustrate this, I believe, by the story from nature.

That's the way really James is using it in his verse there in chapter 1.

They produce pollen, and bees will carry the pollen from 1 flower to another, causing the flower or fruit to reproduce.

Now in the same way, the heart of man is always open, and bees of all kinds seem to bring in the pollen of unholy thoughts.

Now when those evil thoughts are sown in the desires of our nature, sin results.

Just as soon as that evil thought mingles with your nature, your fallen nature, it brings forth an act of sin and death.

We must place a guard at the avenues of the soul to keep that gateway well protected.

We must sift out the impure and unholy thoughts that come along before they are able to enter in and mingle with the carnal nature.

I think of a story here that will illustrate this point perfectly.

The men of Israel were once fighting a battle against the enemy across on the other side of Jordan.

Now these enemy soldiers were actually Israelites that belonged to another 1 of the tribes of Israel, and They dressed alike, they looked alike, and they spoke the same language.

But there was just 1 difference between the Israelites and the enemy on the other side of the river, and that was that the enemy could not pronounce the sound of S-H, of shh.

So when the battle was on the side of Israel, and they had put the enemy to flight, and the enemy was fleeing to cross back over the river, the men of Israel set up a barricade there to stop the enemy from escaping.

But when they came to the river, how would they know whether it was a friend or foe?

Well what they did was make the person pronounce the word Shibboleth.

And if that person said Sibboleth instead of Shibboleth, they knew it was the enemy, and they slew them as traitors.

Now friends, we need to put up some sort of test just like that at the gate of our hearts.

We must catch those evil thoughts before they enter in and make them pronounce the name of Christ.

If they are not able to do it, they should be cast out.

Now we ought to consider very carefully the road we are following.

We may need to change our occupation to get away from temptation.

We may have to give up some things that please us very much in order to avoid that enchanted ground of the devil that might lead us to sin.

Notice something Jesus said in Matthew 5.30, and this has been very much misunderstood a lot of times.

And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee.

For it is profitable for thee that 1 of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.

Now this refers, of course, to the things that the hand might be doing.

It is not talking about literally cutting off the hand, but the occupation of the hand.

If our vocation is likely to bring disobedience, then we should cut off that vocation.

We should stop doing the thing that we are engaged in if it is liable to lead us into sin.

Again in Matthew 5, 29, And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee.

Now this again is not in a literal sense.

We could be minus an eye and still be a great sinner.

If our spiritual nature is offended by what we see, Jesus said, cut it out.

If it presents temptations to do wrong, it is better to cut that thing entirely out of our view.

By the way, there is a lot that might be said right here concerning television.

There is so much evil that comes over that tube, and there is so much evil that appears on the silver screen of the theater, and this command of Christ would apply in about 99% of the cases, I think.

Cut it out if it is liable to lead us to wrong thinking and wrong conduct.

In other words, it is better to lead what the world calls a narrow-minded existence or a one-eyed life than to lead a full life and lose our own soul.

Now somebody might say, well, I am not worried because I am not bothered a lot with temptations.

Ha, ha, listen, when people say that, I get very worried indeed.

In fact, I remember a certain text of the Bible in 1 Corinthians 10, 12.

It says, Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." In other words, that is the time to be careful.

The most unlikely people are overcome by the most unlikely temptations.

Often people are overcome in the very point where they feel the strongest.

Moses, for example, was the meekest man in all the world.

Elijah was a man of great courage and dared to stand up against thousands of false prophets.

Yet he lost out finally by fleeing like a coward into the wilderness in front of an angry woman.

Peter, whose impulsive courage in the garden led him to draw his sword in fight, denied his Lord a few hours later and withered into a cringing coward.

Abraham was a man of great faith, and yet twice he also told cowardly lies in order to save himself.

Yes, when things like this happen to the most unlikely people, we realize our own danger.

No 1 thinks about the results, of course, when temptation is facing him, because temptation comes along the line of least resistance.

Gehazi in the Old Testament saw the flashing colors of the Syrian raiment, not the leprous scars that would come on him as a result of his covetous sin.

Achan saw the goodly Babylonish garment, not the anger of a nation that would rise up to stone him to death.

Judas saw the glitter of gold, not the dark remorse that would seize Him finally and lead Him to a suicide's grave.

Listen, I'll tell you another truth, friends.

Many temptations cease to trouble us as we make good choice a habit.

It becomes automatic for us and the struggle disappears.

I read an article some time ago entitled, Don't Decide to Go to Church.

Now this may sound like a strange article, but the idea was that there is no need for a decision each week about this.

After all, we don't decide 3 times a day whether we are going to eat or not.

We simply take it for granted that we will be eating breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Series

Temptation

Temptation, Part 1

Transcript

Parent Series

Sponsor

Recorded

Temptation

Temptation, Part 2

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The Book of James

The Book of James: Enduring Temptation

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