For thought and meditation

[rl69]

James 1:13-15 Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: 14 But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. 15 Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.

We know that Satan is a great tempter. He will stop at nothing to get God's people to yield to their own sinful nature and stumble. However, My own flesh is often enough to get me into trouble without the devil's influence. The Bible says if we live according to the flesh we will of the flesh reap corruption.

This passage from James says that God tempts no man, but every man is tempted and drawn away of his own lust and enticed. All we have to do is give our own flesh a chance and it will lead us down the paths of sin.

Verse 15 gives us the progression of temptation and sin. It starts with temptation and leads to lust, and once we allow lust to conceive in our hearts it leads ultimately to sin which winds up in death. For the unbeliever it results in spiritual death and eternal separation from God. For even the believer there are physical consequences of sin and many a Christian has gone to an early grave because of the consequences of sin.

It's been said that sin will take you further than you want to go, keep you longer than you want to stay, and cost you more than you want to pay.

[Blackwater]

Wow! What a great post! Sometimes I wonder if we modern Christians don't think and talk about salvation too much, and neglect our attention to temptation and how to avoid it? Temptation is the root and beginning of all sin, whatever that sin might be. Someone wronged you? Tempted to knock their block off? But temptation is something we ALL know, and coming to faith doesn't stop it. If anything, it might even increase it! For Satan just LOVES to get a believer hooked! Our misconceptions about salvation CAN be our greatest weakness! Learning to live like Christ wanted and advised us to will NEVER be easy, but it'll always be worth it. This world was never intended to be another "Eden," but a testing and proving ground. And those who prove themselves worthy receive the gift of eternal life and get to be in Heaven with the Lord and our God, forever. What a day of rejoicing it'll be for those of us who run the race successfully. The lazy and the lacadaisical and those who just don't WANT salvation will inevitably fall by the wayside. How could they justly enter Heaven when so many have run the race fairly, faced every trial and temptation, and learned to overcome them, while those who fall by the wayside just simply quit running the race, and faltered and failed to fulfill their just duty to our Maker? I'm not God, and can't judge, but it's incumbent upon each of us to have a good conception of things like this. This is my belief, at least at this time, but I am FAR from having God's mind, and thus, it'll NEVER be the last word in any of it. I'm just a simple country boy searching for Truth, Justice and the Lord's will for me. That's my full time job. The rest, including my take on the road to salvation and how I think our Lord judges us, is my "play time" activity, wherein I speculate as earnestly and honestly as I can about things that matter more to others than they do to me, really.

"Studying to show ourselves approved" will never be easy, but it's always worth it! Always!