Make Adultery Illegal in all 50 States!

Monday, January 30, 2012

Day 102: Temptation

Affairs are more common than anyone knows but they are so "taboo" that no one talks about them. Perhaps if we opened up more and talked more about them, then they wouldn't be such a temptation.

Lately, everywhere I go, I wonder who around me is having an affair or is trying to recover from one. That stay at home mom in your playgroup.......could be her. Your co-worker in the cube next to you....could be him. The bus driver, the cop, the deli worker, the lawyer, the judge, your general practitioner.....could be any one of them. Temptation doesn't discriminate. Hollywood stars and politicians prove this to us.

Here is how the Bible defines temptation: Temptation is a state experienced when a person thinks thoughts, considers intentions or desires things which are contrary to the thoughts, intents and desires of Almighty God. When those thoughts are fulfilled through action, those intentions translated into achievements and
those desires satisfied by accomplishment, then sin is committed. Sin unrepented of by the
sinner and not forgiven by the Father leads to death. Temptation is a link in the chain of
circumstances that leads to death (Jas. 1:14,15).

So, then I sit here and I think "What is the purpose of temptation?" and "Why must we be so tortured by temptation?"

What I didn't realize when I had an affair is that the consequences of the affair (the sin) go way beyond just me. Like Eve, I was naive enough to think that what I was doing "wasn't so bad". Just a taste of the apple won't hurt anything. Ha! Yea, right. Look at the destruction caused by "just a taste" of temptations. That "just a taste" becomes a wicked after-taste that stays with you forever and, not just in your mouth, but in your head and your heart.

A sin so wicked as infidelity will never leave you once you've committed it. There is a reason we are taught not to break the 10 Commandments. It is for our BENEFIT to live by the 10 Commandments. The pain that follows breaking one of them is not worth the "just a taste" one takes.

So, how do we resist temptation? GET RID OF IT! Forget your affair partner even exists, drain the alcohol down the sink, crush your computer (Have you seen "Fire Proof"?), pretend the drug dealer has died....do whatever you need to do to survive.

God knows it isn't easy.

Mark 9:43

And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell,[a] to the unquenchable fire.

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