Temptation
Tonight, let us think through the M.O. of Temptation.
I believe we are made in the image of the triune God. We have a soul, a body and a spirit: a triune nature. When we are tempted, it will either be in the area of the soul, the body or the spirit. It is important that we understand this concept if we want to know how to overcome temptation.
The world will primarily tempt us in the area of our soul. The word for soul is psyche, which we use to describe an individual's mind, will, and emotions. Our soul contains our ego, our desires, our, emotional self. The world will tempt the soulish side of us. When we talk about a person on an ego trip, or a person that is worldly, we are generally speaking, of a person who is easily influenced by and controlled by the pleasures of this world.
Illustration: When the herdsmen for Abraham and Lot began to fight with each other over range land, Abraham told his nephew to choose some land, and he would go the other way. So, Lot looked out and saw the well-watered plains and the tall grass of the east, and he went in that direction. Lot was already wealthy, but he was sucked into thinking he could be the wealthiest man in Palestine. He was tempted by the world's system to be a big shot. That is the constant message of the world: You need more and you can have more. Lot fell into that trap, and it cost him everything he owned.
The world tempts our soul, but the flesh primarily tempts our body.
Our body will be tempted toward things like lust, laziness, over-indulgence, and sexual immorality.
The flesh wants to use the body as the vehicle for its expression. When King David was walking on the roof of his palace, he spotted a beautiful woman taking a bath. Rather than turn away, he stopped and stared.
Lust rose up inside of him. He was, attacked by the flesh. His mind started to play out scenarios, and instead of returning to his wife, he asked to have that beautiful woman brought to his room. His physical body was under attack by the flesh, and David succumbed to temptation and it brought tremendous pain into his life.
The third foe, the devil, wars against our spirit. If our soul is our sense of self-consciousness, our spirit is our sense of God-consciousness. You know God through your spirit. Animals have a body and a soul, but no spirit; and that is what makes man more than an animal....
... middle of paper ...
...ur sin under the blood of Jesus and you will no longer have to be on the defensive. You can just remind yourself, "I have been redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ. I resist the devil and temptation in the name of Almighty God. My body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, and I will not let the devil trespass on His property. With God, I will resist. To fight includes resisting and standing firm against the enemy of our soul.
Turn to James 4:7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Turn to1 Peter 5:8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.
In II Cor.2: 11 Paul warns us about how luring and deceptive the devil can be He warns us "in order that Satan might not outwit us for we are not unaware of his schemes. Satan has written no books, but God in order that we might win over Satan has. Through God’s Power, by Faith, Flight and Fight we can Defeat the Tempter and his Temptations. Change My Heart O God. Sing I Surrender All-4 verses
Larson uses this metaphor to send a message that the ruthless drive to succeed is harmful to the wellbeing of a civilization. The direction in which Larson is “pushing the world” towards is away from materialism and power. He views ambition as destructive to the morality of the people it inhabits, and to the people affected by those goal-obsessed civilians. Larson’s ironic statements and comparing and contrasting of people and places serve to show that you cannot have immense fame, power, and success without
Loving God and hating his own mother kept David strong. David loved God, he prayed every night to God. He hated his mother so much he wanted to outthink her tricks, he did. He used different tactics like over exaggerating his pain when he got beat, putting a wet cloth over his mouth when his mother put cleaning products in a room with him. David kept counting time in his head in order to make the time pass faster.
Scott Fitzgerald respectively) and applying both the Marxist and Psychoanalytic critical theories, it’s clear to see that the race to get to the highest crest of the metaphorical food chain affects the people on the top, on the bottom, and everyone in between, which causes a divide in society and consequently forces people to adopt the mindset of “get rich or die trying,” or else their lives will amount to nothing.
who is evil. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him
one has ever seen, felt, touched, smelled, or tasted a soul, it is a mysterious
The devil has taken on many forms in both legend and media throughout history. Whether it is a con-man in a suit, or a vicious minotaur-like monster, the devil has been a representation of human evil since his conception. Satan in both Dante’s Inferno and Peter Cook’s Bedazzled is seen as an evil figure forced into an eternity of punishment, yet sympathetic because of this. However, both representations of the devil differ in how much power Satan is allotted. As humanity continues to define true evil, it must decide for itself how much power it allows evil in this world.
you must not live of it, you must avoid it and stay aimed towards salvation. Even John
All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.” (Holy Bible, ESV).
Temptation is all around us. It covers the walls that we see each day and even the phones that we text on each morning when we wake up. We can’t get away from it and we never will because it was put on this Earth for a reason, to weed out the true believers of Jesus Christ. Hippolytus, a beloved Saint, and a disciple of John, was a well-respected Christian martyr and antipope from 218 to 235 A.D. He was a very controversial writer and his writing were often forgotten since they were written in Greek and schismatic. One of his many writings focused on the returning of Christ and the teachings, visions, and the coming of the Anti-Christ, as well as the temptation that the Anti-Christ possess. Many people of the Bible have seen the Anti-Christ
In scripture, we can see that more than once Jesus cast out demons from people and had the power to shut their mouths. In Luke 11:14 one can see the power of Christ over demons, “And He was casting out a demon, and it was mute; when the demon had gone out, the mute man spoke; and the crowds were amazed.” Another place in scripture that we can see where evil gets its power from is in the book of Job. Satan had to ask for God’s permission to torment Job. We know by this that any authority Satan has, has been given to him by God. God has given him the authority over worldly things as mentioned in John 14:20; however, it is important to remember that Satan cannot do anything that is outside of God’s will and purposes. In 1 John 4:4 we are reminded that as long as we have Christ in us, we ...
a devil is sick of sin, it is no longer a devil, this means that the
There are two major religious beliefs on the soul, and though they may seem diametrically opposed, we must remember that our ideas on the soul exist only because of the conditioned acceptance of these religiou...
of evil, and Hell’s Satan as a creature seemingly capable of good. At every moment, good
After reading Book 1 of Paradise Lost, which was about Satan starting to plot against God, I was impressed by Satan’s determination to make an attempt to take over Heaven once again, even though he and his followers were chained to the flaming lake, tortured, as their punishment from God. I admired the fallen angels’ determination to defeat God by warping his good creations to evil, since they all know that God is too powerful for them. Although Satan is banished from Heaven, and cast down to Hell by God, Satan’s evil character has not changed.
... guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Whatever it is, God can help (“Bible”).