Overcoming Temptation

If you would join me in 1 Corinthians chapter number 10, 1 Corinthians 10, and looking forward to jumping into this message this evening, 1 Corinthians chapter 10.

I think this is such a needful sermon for us to navigate through in our lives, to be reminded of, to be encouraged and led with. And it has to do with overcoming temptation. Anybody ever feel like you face temptation in life? All kinds of different ways we can face temptation. And I think every one of us face it on a daily basis. It can hit us in many, many different ways. You can feel like a very patient person and then that person pulls right in front of you and your patients just as tempted, right?

So a lot of things in life can cause that. But let's read verse 1 down to verse 13, 1 Corinthians 10. It says, Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant how that all our fathers were under the cloud and all passed through the sea and were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. And did all eat the same spiritual meat and did all drink the same spiritual drink for they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them. And that rock was Christ.

And so we see that Christ is in the Old Testament as the pillar of cloud by day, the pillar of cloud and fire by day and night that went before Israel, Christ pre incarnate. And so verse 5, But with many of them God was not well pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. Now these things, notice what he says, were our examples to the intent we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted. Neither be idolaters as some of them as it is written.

The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play. Neither let us commit fornication as some of them committed and fell in one day twenty thousand. Neither let us tempt Christ as some of them also tempted and were destroyed of the serpents.

Neither murmur ye as some of them also murmured and were destroyed of the destroyer. Now all these things happened unto them for examples and they are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come. And then he says in verse 12, let's read that together, Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. And verse 13 goes on and says, There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man. But God is faithful who will not suffer or allow you to be tempted above that ye are able but will with the temptation also make a way of escape that you may be able to bear it. Father we thank you for your word tonight. We pray that you would have your hand upon this service that if anyone tonight is going through challenges that they feel beaten down by, overwhelmed by, that your grace would sustain them. Help us to be those who are strong in the grace and the faith of Christ. Lord I pray that you would keep us and preserve us faultless and blameless before your throne of grace with exceeding joy. That Lord we would honor you and not be ashamed of you at your coming because we are in some sin. Lord may we live a life that is worthy of our King. Lord and I pray tonight that if anyone doesn't know Christ that tonight would be the night of salvation.

In Jesus name we pray and God's people said men you may be seated. Well temptation is a reality that all of us face. Temptation is something that starts in our life when we're young. We crave things that are forbidden. You turn me down a little bit.

I'm ringing to myself on the microphone. But we crave things that are forbidden to us. We want to do things that are wrong. We're tempted to run past the boundaries of what is moral and right.

And that's in us innately as a child. The Bible refers to this and teaches this level of depravity that we desire things that are forbidden. Thomas Secampus says temptations discover what we are.

I like what Francis Fenelon said. He says temptations are a file which rub off much of the rust of our self-confidence. One thing that you realize is in life if you thought you were going to be super spiritual and overcome any type of temptation in life to ever even be tempted you have deceived yourself and you realize that all of us face the reality of our own inherent sinfulness.

We desire that which is wrong so often in life. Martin Luther said my temptations have been my masters in divinity. It will test you. It will challenge you. It will prove you. It will see what you're made of. When you are put through the furnace of temptation the question is what comes out in your life.

It will expose you. So in 1 Corinthians 10 Paul laid out the example of Israel to the church at Corinth. How they were extremely blessed by God.

God just dumped his hand of blessing upon the nation of Israel. And in spite of their being blessed by God they become prideful, unthankful, they begin to pursue sinful things. They quickly turned after lust. You remember when Moses went up on the mountain to receive the Ten Commandments when he was descending that mountain after 40 days it was less than two months that they had already descended into idolatry, right? They made a golden calf. They took off their clothes and began to commit fornication and lustful sinful things.

They fell away very quickly. And Paul reminds us here in verse 1-12 how that they did that. How that they lusted and fell after sin and tested God's patience.

They also murmured and complained. They were not thankful. They did not trust God. God put them through these trials for the purpose of growing their faith but instead of it growing they kept showing their faith was unwilling to grow. They were like toddlers in the faith.

They just took a few weeks to get out of Egypt but it took 40 years to get Egypt out of them. It was just that sinful fleshly desire that they had. And so after laying out the fall of Israel as an example of those who went from blessing to God's judgment, he says this in verse number 12 that we read together. He says, Wherefore let him that thinketh that he stands, he needs to take heed that he also does not fall. This is a warning to us that we would say, well, I would never do that. I'm sure that we all have said this at some point where you read through the Old Testament of the nation of Israel and you're like, these guys don't have a brain.

Anybody ever feel like that? I mean, just it's the truth. We read and then we think, how do you doubt God? I mean, he just sent down 10 plagues. He opened up the Red Sea, killed everybody. And then you're going to doubt him?

And it's like, well, God's poured out all the blessings on us. They didn't have the Old Testament and the New Testament to read. They didn't have churches to go through every week. They didn't have all the blessings that we have, 2000 years of church history and the truth of Christ, the gospels.

They didn't have all of these things. And they had some empirical things that they witnessed, but the Word of God is even more powerful than physical signs and wonders. And so this is a warning against the pride that can swell up in even our hearts to say, boy, I wouldn't doubt God. And we doubt God when we have a cabinet full of food, right?

Running water that never runs out. And we complain and doubt God about little things. And so this warning against pride is something that we need to take note of. Many Christians have fallen into sin because they have the mindset that this will never happen to me. I just wouldn't fall into that. Proverbs 16, 18 says, pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall. One of the last statements before a person goes down the road of sin is it will never happen to me.

I'll never do that. There's a king in the Old Testament named Uzziah, 2 Chronicles 26. Uzziah reigned for 52 years in Jerusalem. He was a faithful king. He faithfully sought after God and God just poured his blessing out on Uzziah.

2 Chronicles 26, 4 says, and he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord according to all that his father Amaziah did. He sought God in the days of Zechariah who had understanding in the visions of God. And it says this, and as long as he sought the Lord, God made him to prosper.

It's a good equation. Put God first and you find the rain of his blessing, the showers of his blessing were coming down upon him. In verse 6 and 7 of 2 Chronicles 26, he fought the Philistines. God gave him victory. Verse 7 says, and God helped him against the Philistines, against the Arabians, against that dwelt in Gerbal and Mahunims. And then in verse 8 it says, and the Ammonites also gave him gifts.

He became famous. Verse 8 says, and the Ammonites gave gifts to Uzziah and his name spread abroad, even to the entering in of Egypt, for he strengthened himself exceedingly. So he's just obeying God. Blessings are pouring down.

Things just continue to increase. He builds up the city in verse 9 and 10. He builds up his military, verse 11 through 14.

He's doing everything well to be a good king. But then 2 Chronicles 26, 15 says this, and he made in Jerusalem engines and invented by cunning men and to be on the towers and upon bulwarks to shoot arrows and great stones withal. And his name spread far abroad for he was marvelously helped. And notice what it says here, till he was strong. But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction. For he transgressed against the Lord.

And you know what he did? His transgression against the Lord was that he went into the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar. He did something spiritual. His error was taking incense and doing what God had only designed for the priest to do. He usurped the position of the priest because, hey, God's hands all over me.

I mean, with God's hands on my life, I can begin to do really about anything and it's just God's blessings follow me. And that mindset was actually the exact same mindset of Peter, wasn't it? Blessed are you, Simon Peter, for flesh and blood didn't reveal that to you, but my Father in heaven. Well, boy, if heaven's now revealing truth to me, then when Jesus starts talking about his crucifixion, guess who rebukes Jesus?

The one who the Father was speaking through, right? So he rebukes Jesus and guess what? He stepped out of the bounds of what God had given him license to do. And when you're rebuking Jesus, you are on the wrong side of the argument.

And he was lifted up with pride and the same thing happened to King Uzziah. And it's very important to know that when God blesses your life, you must remain humble. The only reason that Lighthouse has seen blessing and prosperity and a congregation go from eight to 700 people and a building paid off and all the things, it's not because of you and it's not because of me.

It's actually in spite of us. It's the glory of God blessing the faithful proclamation and service to him and his word. And if we ever go outside of the bounds of what God has called us to do and begin to usurp God, then we are running on our own and we are calling for his judgment. So we must always stay humble before him. God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble, right? Jesus said in Matthew 23, whoever exalts himself will be humbled, whoever humbles himself will be exalted. And so let the blessing of God produce humility in you. It should cause you to recognize your self, the lack of self value that you on your own are unworthy of such blessings, that you would humble yourself and not exalt yourself when God's blessings come.

I mean Nebuchadnezzar in the Old Testament is an example of one who rejected the command of God to stay humble and he exalts himself and God has his way of humbling us. I can tell you, temptation is a way to keep you humble. I think that the reason you and I face temptation in life that can come in different ways is because God doesn't want to remove all of those temptations.

Because if he did, we would look at other people and be like, I don't even know why you ever struggle with sin. How do you ever struggle with that? Well, I haven't had any struggles for the last 20 years, but that's not the case for any of us unless somebody here is living in a delusion. The older you get, sometimes you feel like the temptations can increase.

Isn't it odd? Well, I thought I'd be over that by now. I thought I wouldn't have any struggles in life anymore. And so the reality is, the Bible says in Galatians 6, 3, if a man thank himself to be something, when he's nothing, he deceives himself.

You and I can begin to lift ourself up. But Satan wants us to be pulled into sin through temptation, and pride is the vice that can bring the victorious believer down. Faith in self is the whisper of the enemy, and it is embraced in this society. It's the statement that says things like this, you just need to believe in yourself more. You just need to trust in yourself. You just need to follow your heart.

I'm like, well, that's a terrible idea. I don't want to follow my heart. I have to deny my heart. I have to follow the Word of God and take up my cross and follow Him. You ever read Romans 7? There are some who think Romans 7 was written before Paul got saved, like he's talking about his life before he's a convert, before he became a believer. It's not Paul when he was away from God saying that, because when Paul was not a believer, he thought he was great, right? He didn't think he was a sinner. He's like, man, he's following the law perfectly. What Romans 7 is, when he says, a wretched man that I am, in me dwelleth no good thing, and I mean, he just lays it down in my flesh is corruption.

Romans 7 is Paul walking closer to Christ than he ever had been. The closer you get to the sun, the more you see the spots in your own life. In the dark, everybody looks good.

Turn the light on and you're like, whoa! So this is the reality of our life. When we come into the light of the glory of God, we see ourselves as Isaiah did. Isaiah didn't stand up and say, Lord, I've been doing pretty good. No, he fell down and said, woe is me. And so never let the words, I'll never fail you, Lord, come out of your mouth, because that's really the mindset of Peter. And Peter denied Christ three times before the rooster crowed, right? So tonight I want to look at some keys to how to overcome temptation.

No matter how old or young you are, you're going to face temptations in life. They can come through family. They can come through finances. They can come through health.

They can come through government. I could only watch about 30 minutes of the debate last night because it creates stress. Does anybody else feel like that? Raise your hand if it doesn't create stress. I'm just curious if that happens to anybody.

So anybody else have to turn it off after a while because it's just like, I'd rather go to bed and like rest well. But anyway, there's a lot I could say about that. But I would say it is concerning that the border issue has become a local issue. I have nothing against Haitians.

I want the gospel to go to every Haitian in the world and to see them come to Christ. But it is an unwise thing. It is an unwise thing to open a border up and allow people to come in because there's some studies that have been done on this to where there's no way that we could reach and help all the poverty in the world right now. And when you're letting people into your country, you're only taking a small fraction of people that are living in poverty. While global poverty is growing at this massive rate, the way you help them isn't by letting some impoverished people into your country. It's by going to their country and giving them the tools and equipping them where they live to produce what they need to produce. So if you really want to help them instead of spending billions on the situations here, why don't we go over there and set up ways to train them to help them in the land to prosper where they are, where they can speak the native language. And what can happen too is many times the people coming to America are not the people who don't have any understanding about things. It's the people who have ambition.

And then we're pulling those people who have ambition to excel out of their countries into our country and it leaves those other countries worse off. There's a lot that could go into that, but it just, anyway. I'm glad DeWine's trying to step up now and he's going to be sending in some troops and things, I think state troopers and different things to step in. But after the alarm bells have been going off, I just know that if you and I have been living up in Springfield, which is what, 35 minutes away, that's a pretty heavy load for people to carry right now up there. And it's only a matter of time until local places like this are dealing with those kinds of situations. And it's not that you don't want to help people, but I can tell you, you can only open your help up to so many situations and it just creates a lot of, if it's not done wisely. So we need to pray for that, understanding that anybody that's an immigrant is not an enemy and we need to make sure we talk about them as God's creation, right? You have a soul made in the image of God and we love them and want to see them have the gospel brought to them, but we also understand that borders are a wise thing in any country. That's why we lock our doors at night, right?

Because you don't want your doors wide open for anybody to come in. So five things tonight. First of all, understand that temptation will come. Temptations will come. The word temptation here in verse 13, and we're just going to break down verse 13 tonight. It says, there has no temptation taken you such as is common to man. The word temptation there is the familiar Greek word perasmos. Now perasmos simply means a test. It's a test and it does not carry any negative meaning. We see the word temptation and it immediately carries a negative connotation. It could be translated, there has no test taken you, but such is common to man.

There is no trial taken you. There has no temptation, but it's the idea of simply a test that's designed to prove you. So just understand the Greek word carries the idea of a trial, something that is neutral.

It is not negative. Now God sends trials in our life as a, he sends perasmos in our lives as a way to grow our faith, to teach us to trust him. And if we respond in faith, then we will grow as we trust God to overcome that. But if we do not choose to trust God, it will become a allurement or a temptation to sin.

The perasmos then can be a trial to grow or a temptation to bring you down. You could hold your place here and flip over to James chapter 1. I'll point a couple of verses out just to show you this. James 1 is such a wonderful chapter. But in James 1 verse number 2, James is speaking about external trials that people face, external trials. And notice what he says in James chapter 1 verse number 2.

He said, blessed are you when you, my brethren, count it all joy when you fall into diverse perasmos. It says temptation, but I would prefer the word be trials, because again, temptation carries the idea of an allurement to sin. And he's not talking about an allurement to sin. He's not saying blessed are you when you're being allured to sin. It's not what he's saying.

Words matter. So he's saying blessed are you when you fall into different trials, various kinds of testings, knowing that the trying, that's why the, knowing that the, and it carries that perasmos, the trying of your faith worketh patience. Now what he does in verse 1 down to verse number 11 is talks about testings that you go through. But then in verse 12 through 15, he talks about how perasmos can be temptations. And then he says in verse 12, blessed is the man that endureth perasmos, which there I think the right word is temptation, for when he's tried, he shall receive the crown of life. And no man say when he's tempted, I am tempted of God. This is talking about a temptation which is an allurement to sin. God doesn't allure you to sin.

Now God's purpose in testing us is in James 1, 3, and 4. He says, knowing that the trying of your faith worketh patience, builds patience and endurance. If you play sports, you know that it is through the trial of conditioning, of running, of exerting force that wears you out, that builds stamina. You increase your lung capacity.

You can do more. I remember in college when we'd start off the year in basketball, we warmed up with a three mile jog. Three mile jog? I haven't run three miles since, you know, one setting really very often. So it's, but you, he would make us suffer for two weeks. The first two weeks, well, could I just have the flu, Lord?

I mean, this would be the time to have it, you know, get out all this conditioning. But after you got yourself in shape, then you're really, you're really paced to do that. And that's the idea, is once you go through trials, it builds up the endurance, is what the idea of patience there, that you can persevere through different hardships. Then when you get into verse number 13, 14, and 15, he's here talking about, look at verse number 15. This is Satan's purpose. God's purpose is to build your endurance. But Satan's purpose in verse 15, it says that when lust hath conceived, it brings forth sin. Sin when it's finished brings death.

And that's what Satan wants to do. He wants to turn these trials into allurements to sin. And so when we face trials, and you need to understand, they're external to us.

So like when a test comes, it's external. It's when you internalize it that it becomes a temptation. It's when it enters your heart. And guess how it enters your heart? Because you're not guarding your heart, right? That's why the Bible says keep your heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life. When I allow something on the outside to enter in on the inside, and ask yourself, how can that be?

How does that come about? Well, we only have so many ways and senses, physical senses, that you can receive information in your heart. What you see, what you smell, what you hear, but mostly through what you see, touch, and hear. So you have to guard your eyes, you guard what you hear, you guard what's coming in your faculties. And when you read the Bible, you find that it's really in these areas that the people in the Bible would fall. They would begin to look upon things they shouldn't, and they begin to dwell upon things.

You think about Achan. He said, I looked upon a good Babylonish garment and 200 pieces of silver and a wedge of gold. And he begins to gaze upon this.

And then he says, and then I coveted them. When you look at the wrong thing long enough, it produces covetousness, physical things. Lust is the sexual part of that, physical part of that. So if you look upon material things, it turns too long, it turns into covetousness. If you look on physical sinful things, it turns into lust and the air of relationships. And when that internalizes, it produces sin that starts internally, but it will become external.

It grows into that. So Deuteronomy 8, 2 talks about how God would test Israel externally to, I'll read Deuteronomy 8, 2, but he explains why he says, thou shall remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these 40 years in the wilderness to humble thee, to prove thee, to know what was in your heart and whether you would keep the commandments or not. And so he humbled thee, he says, and he suffered thee to hunger and fed you with manna that you did not know, neither did your fathers know that he might make you know that man does not live by bread only. He's wanting you to know that it's not by bread only that you live by every word of God. And so, but can I trust that?

Can I believe that? Or do I believe I need something more than the word of God? Hebrews 3 verse 8 says, harden out your hearts as in the provocation in the day of temptation. Again, that word in the day of parasmos, in the day of trial and testing in the wilderness. Again, I prefer that it be the word trial or testing because God wasn't tempting them to sin.

He was testing them. So when the fathers tempted or tried or tested me, proved me and saw my works 40 years, wherefore I was grieved with that generation, he said, they do always err in their heart. They have not known my way, so I swear to my wrath they shall not enter into my rest.

And then he goes over to the people of that day, says, take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God. Because what happens is trials will begin to cause us to doubt God if we don't turn to him. So the external test reveals what's on the inside of us. It doesn't create it, it reveals it. Like if I believe God and a test comes, I'm going to keep believing God. But if I don't have faith, the trial just reveals me.

It didn't. You ever have something in life and it's like, well, they just made me so upset, or they just know actually that's the external force just showing what you really are on the inside. And that's a humbling thing. Well, I just lose my patience with yourself.

It's us. It wasn't the driver that pulled in front of us that created that frustration on the inside. That frustration on the inside is a sin nature that we have, a sinful tendency that we have that we have to harness that. Do we not think we're going to be tested? Do we think the worst thing that could happen to us is a guy pulls out in front of us and slows us down in traffic? Is that going to overwhelm us? And we doubt why they complained after three days with no water in the wilderness. You know what I mean?

We murmur very easily. So the people of Israel often turned testings into temptation and they tempted God. The stress for the Israelites to increase their faith became a temptation that caused them to sin. One commentator says, every difficult thing that comes into my life either strengthens me because I obey God and stay confident, or I am tempted to doubt God, deny His word and disobey Him.

And it becomes a solicitation to evil. And so sometimes people ask the question on the impeccability of Christ. Could Jesus have sinned or could He not have sinned, is the question.

I know it sounds kind of philosophically strange. I do not believe Jesus had the capacity to sin. Impossible. There's no way the Holy Son of God could sin. If you believe Jesus could sin, then God can sin.

Right? Well, He's in a physical body. Yeah, God is in a body. Well, the Bible says He was tempted externally. The temptations came against the outside, but they never internalized in Him. He was tempted in all points like as we are yet without sin. Jesus never like lusted after a woman. He never coveted after things.

They may have come against Him externally, but He never internalized that. This is the impeccable sinless righteous Son of God. You see this in Matthew 4.

Matthew 4, when Jesus was led up with the Spirit into the wilderness. He was tempted for 40 days. Could the temptations have been from anybody more alluring than Satan? Do you know the Bible says God restrains Satan from tempting us or all of us? We would all fall today.

Right? I mean, the only reason you don't fall into sin is because God is faithful. He will not allow you to be tempted above that which you're able to bear. Jesus, there was no restraints. All hell come against Him. Bring it all. And then I'll fast for 40 days out there.

Right? So He goes out 40 days in the wilderness. Satan throws everything he can at Jesus. And it's one of the most powerful stories because He goes out there with nothing but the Word of God as the Logos of God.

Nobody's out there with Him to say, hey, let me write down what happened. This is what Jesus did. This is what Satan said.

This is how He, it's not what happened. Jesus comes back and gives them the shortened version. This is what happened when I went out and this is how I overcame Satan. So the greatest, the great Son of God against the great tempter and the way He overcame him was through the Deuteronomy 8, 2 and 3 sufficient Word of God. He quoted scripture. It is written. It is written.

It is written. That's why a faithful teacher, a faithful teacher, a faithful parent will teach those underneath their tutelage. Learn to know what is written because the way you respond to victory over sin is by knowing this. It's not by emotionalism.

It's not by some energy you have. It is by the truth. The truth is what gives us freedom and we must know the truth and we must respond to it. It is the sword.

It is, the Word of God is the sword that we must use to overcome these things. Now, um, so, so I want you to understand it's like a coin. A prasmos is like a coin. On one side is a trial that God brings in our life to grow us. On the other side is a temptation that Satan brings to try to bring us down. The coin is the prasmos. It's the situation.

It's neutral. How we respond to that will determine whether we grow to glorify God or we're lured into sin and we dishonor him and fall into that. Now in life you're going to face temptation. James 1 2 says, my brother encountered all joy when you fall into diverse temptations. James 1 13, when he is tempted. So, so it's temptation is not an if, it's a when. What kind of attitude did James say we should face it with? In James chapter 1 verse 2, he says, my brother encountered all joy.

The word count there is actually a financial term. It means to evaluate. You are not glad about the trial, but you're glad about what can be produced from the trial. Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience, builds endurance is the idea. It gives you stamina as a Christian.

JC Ryle said trials are intended to make us think, to wean us from the world and to send us to the Bible, to drive us to our knees. I was reading a little bit about Charles Spurgeon this week. Most of you know he was probably the greatest preacher, I would say the greatest preacher in England's history. He was known as the Prince of Preachers. He would preach to over 5,000 people every Sunday. He preached 600 sermons before he was 20 years old. On October 19, 1856, he preached for the first time in the music hall of the Royal Surrey Gardens because his own church could not hold the masses. It had about a 10,000 seat capacity.

He was 22 years old. In the midst of this massive gathering, they were doing a special thing. Someone shouted fire.

There was no fire. It created a stampede effect in the thousands of people. Seven people died that day. It so struck Spurgeon in his heart, they said that was one of the reasons he died at 57, they believe.

He carried that weight. He would fall into great depression sometimes. He married Susanna Thompson on January 8 in the same year of the calamity at the gardens. His only two children, he had twin sons, were born the day after the calamity. Susanna was never able to have more children. In 1865, nine years later, when she was 33 years old, she became virtually invalid and seldom heard her husband preach for the next 27 years until her own death.

She had some kind of rare cervical operation they attempted, did not help. Spurgeon suffered from gout, rheumatism, and Bright's disease which is an inflammation of your kidneys. They said he only preached about two-thirds of the time in the pulpit. His health was so bad and deteriorated, he could not even ascend the pulpit. On top of the physical sufferings, Spurgeon had to endure a lifetime of public ridicule, slander. His wife kept a bulging scrapbook of criticism from 1855 to 18, just one year of it, and it was just slamming him constantly. He was a Calvinist and a faithful preacher, but there were those on the Arminian side that were slamming him.

And then there were hyper-Calvinists who were saying that he's not even a Christian. He said this, down on my knees have I often fallen with the hot sweat rising from my brow under some fresh slander poured upon me. In an agony of grief my heart has been well nigh broken. He suffered tremendously, but yet he endured until the end.

He never stopped. There were times his depression would come upon him and he said it was like just such a darkness. He would go into bouts of depression for sometimes months at a time. And unless a person's really gone down the road of depression, I think it's a spiritual assault many times.

They can't really understand what it is. Again, this is a man who studied 18 hours a day, wrote 144 books. 20,000 sermons sent out a week people were buying. He was, the influence was supernatural. God's hand was over this man in such a dynamic way. And listen to what he says about suffering and hardship. He says in spite of all the suffering and persecution he endured to the end and was able to preach mightily the blessing of God. And he says this, I am afraid that all the grace that I have got out of my comfortable and easy times and happy hours might almost lie on a penny. But the good that I have received from my sorrows and pains and griefs is altogether incalculable.

He said I bear witness that the worst days I have ever had have turned out to be my best days. I can bear my personal testimony that the best piece of furniture that I ever had in the house was a cross. I do not mean a material cross. I mean the cross of affliction and trouble. In shunning a trial we are seeking to avoid a blessing he says. Blessed are you when you fall into these trials, right?

I know they don't feel like blessings, but if you and I carved away every trial we had what kind of person would we be here tonight? We would be thin. We would be frail. Our character would be weak.

We would get pushed over by the smallest breeze. It's like the child who's been protected by their parent and they're 18 years old and mommy's still holding his hand, right? It's not good. So number two, temptations want to overcome you. He says there has no temptation taking you. The word taking you means seized you, assailed you.

Like an enemy grabbing you, wanting to pull you down. One well-known preacher shared this story. He says how a friend of his had a new job at a company and he was working late one night.

He was very excited about the new position that he had. He said he was leaving the office one night and there was a large sum of money that was left on a desk that he was at. He didn't know who it belonged to and so he put it in his suitcase, took it home. He said he came back the next day, went into the boss's office and he says, hey, I need to let you know there was a large sum of money left on my desk last night and I don't know whose it was but I need to let you know because I don't know where it came from. And the boss says, I put it there.

It was a test to you. Now what would happen if that man went home and he opened that up and he began to look at that money? What if he counted it? Do you think counting it would have affected him? And then having the idea of what all that I could do with this.

What could I spend this on? And then his mind could have gone to, if anybody asked any questions, he easily could have come up with ways to conceal that. This is the reality of life. So in our life, we're going to face external temptations. And when you read Genesis 3, you have Satan coming to Eve and saying, getting into a conversation with her, she begins to look at the tree and listen to what the Bible says, how it words it in Genesis 3, 6, when the woman saw that the tree was good for food. She saw it was good for food. Up to that point, we don't know that she ever really looked at it, right? But what happens when you begin to look at what is forbidden?

You have to guard yourself from even looking. She saw that the tree was good for food. Oh, actually you could eat that, that it was pleasant to the eyes.

Man, now that you talk about it, that looks really good. I mean, if you're on a diet and your dear wife makes chocolate chip cookies and they're still warm, you ever know when you're not supposed to eat them and they're on the counter and you just touch them. How long has it been there?

And they're soft. It has entered the heart. I mean, it has gone down.

It ain't long until the other goes down, right? And she saw it and the tree to be desired to make one wise, she took it. So if taking is the sin, you have to cut off the looking to not get to the taking. So temptation wants to seize your heart.

It wants to latch on. And the Lord's model prayer in Matthew 6, this is a prayer that all of us should pray. In Matthew 6 13, he says, and pray this, lead us not into temptation. Don't lead us into an allurement to sin in any way. Let us not be led into that, but deliver us from evil.

Deliver us from the evil one. So when the parasmus comes, God, don't let that, don't let me go on the other side of the coin. Let me face that test and grow from that.

Don't let me be led over here. Jesus is telling us to pray that God will not allow those tests to turn into an allurement to sin. So temptations will come.

Secondly, they want to overcome you. Thirdly, temptation is normal. He says, there is no temptation taken to you but that which is common to man.

It's from the root word anthropos, literally that which is human, characteristic of belonging to mankind. The point Paul is making here is there's no superhuman temptation that you have. It's not like, well, there's nothing I could do about it.

No, there actually was. You never face temptations that are completely unique to you that no one else has faced. It's common to man. Our circumstances sometimes can line up a little odd and differently, but our temptations are generally the same. Jesus faced temptations. Again, they were external to him.

They were real. I believe the assaults that Jesus faced were, again, even greater than what we face because all hell was unleashed upon him. God calls the believer not only to stay strong in the Lord, but we're also to help one another when we fall into temptation. Galatians 6 one and two says, brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, you which are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of meekness. You see somebody getting caught up in a sin, you go to them, right? Not because you're looking down your nose at them, you come in meekness, you're wanting to bring them up out of that. And notice what it says, considering yourself lest you also get tempted, bear you one another's burden and so for the law of Christ, you have to guard your own heart.

And this is true, isn't it? We have to keep ourself in a place where we're not getting pulled into sin even when we minister to other people. So temptation is normal. Number four, God is faithful in the midst of temptation. It goes on in verse 13 of 1 Corinthians 10, it says, but God is faithful. Matthew Henry said, we live in a, indeed a tempting world.

We're compassed with snares and what a comfort it is to have this passage. God is faithful to not allow you and I to be tempted more than what we can handle. No Christian can say they did not have the resources to overcome temptation.

The reason is, is because God's faithful. Listen to what a couple of these verses say, 1 John 4, for you are of God, little children and have overcome them because greater is he that is in you than he that's in the world. It's not your power that overcomes temptation. It's the Lord who gives you this victory. That's why when temptation comes, we don't lean on our own understanding. Philippians, I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me. People say, God will never give you more than you can handle.

Not true. There's a lot of things that are more than you and I can handle, but not more than what he can handle through us. Peter can't walk on water. It's more than he can handle, but it's not more than what he can handle with Christ. That's why 2 Corinthians 3, 5, not that we're sufficient to think anything is of ourself, our sufficiency is of God. And even Paul with his thorn in the flesh, he's like, I got to get rid of this perosmos, this trial in my flesh, get rid of this Lord.

And the Lord's like, you don't need it to be gone. You just need my strength. And he says, well, then I rejoice in this because now I realize when I'm weak, I'm actually stronger. Do you realize that in the times you feel weak, you can actually be strong?

And oftentimes the times we feel strong is just because we're not facing a perosmos. So God is the believer's right arm and strength. One of the things that I pray weekly is Luke 22, 32. Peter's facing a temptation in the garden. And although Peter failed, God did not fail. Jesus said he would keep him. In Luke 22, 32, in verse 31, he says, Satan has desired to sift you, Peter, as wheat. I mean, what happens when Jesus comes to you and says, Satan himself is coming after you. He wants to sift your life. You'd be like holding Jesus's hand right there.

Well, you know, well then do something, you know. Now what does Jesus do? Like what's the best recourse?

What's the highest tier that you can go to for defense? We know one of them is in Matthew 4. Satan's tempting Jesus, the word of God, recourse, right?

Recourse, recourse, recourse. It is written, it is written, it is written. But in Luke 22, 32, what's the best thing you can do for someone else?

He says, but I have what? I prayed for you. That your faith fell not, that thy faith fell not, and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren. I pray this all the time. Jesus, pray for me, my family, pray for your church, pray for that individual that's going through that, as you prayed for Peter. Intercede for me, intercede for us, that you would present us faultless and blameless before your throne of grace with exceeding joy.

Don't you want to stand before God one day with exceeding joy because you have been faithful to him? And guess who's the only one that can keep you? 1 Peter 1 15, who are kept by the power of God. Jude 24, listen to this verse. Now unto him that is able to keep you from what?

Falling, and to present you what? Faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. And it can be great to be there and say, yes, I overcame through the blood of Christ. Yes, he kept me.

I finished the course that he gave me to run. But how tragic, Jesus said, there will be people who will be ashamed at his coming. Because can you imagine being caught up in some sinful thing and the Lord returns?

The last thing you were involved in was some sin of some kind? Wouldn't it be great to know that you just led somebody to Christ and then the Lord returns? 2 Peter 2 9, the Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptation.

2 Timothy 4 18, this is again the last writing of Paul. He says, the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work and will preserve me unto his heavenly kingdom. You see, the faith of God's faithful is resting in God's faithfulness.

You lean on him, not by might nor by power, but by his Spirit, right? God will make a way for you to escape that you may be able to bear it. It goes on to say the way of escape is literally an egress. It's a way that you can get out. It has a definite article in front of it, the way of escape, it could be worded, which means there is only one way. There is a way out and there is one way out. The point is the way to escape temptation is not to avoid temptation in life.

It's impossible. It is rather to go through temptation. The way out is through it. You don't flee the Philistines, you defeat them. Now there are things you need to flee from, flee fornication, right? Joseph fled, right? There are some things you flee, but the hardships, the trials, the prosmos, those situations land in everybody's life. God will bring them into our life.

You don't flee those. It's not like, God, I need to get rid of this messenger of Satan that's buffeting me, as Paul prayed. It's that I can go through that by leaning on Christ and finding strength in the Lord. It isn't less trials I need, it's more of Christ that I need, dependence upon Him. So let me wrap this up. How to have victory against temptation.

Let me give you the last couple of things as we close. First of all, recognize how to gain victory. Recognize them as an opportunity to grow and mature, to prove that you're faithful to Christ. It's not if you face trials, it's when. So count it all joy. Count it all joy. And many of us tonight are probably going through a trial. And you have to see that as something God has sovereignly allowed into your life to strengthen you, to grow you, to glorify His name and to cause more fruit in your life.

The farmer prunes that which he desires to produce more. Job said in Job 23, 10, but he knoweth the way that I take, when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. First Peter 1, 6, the trial of your faith is much more precious than gold that perishes. Though it be tried with fire might be found under the praise and honor and glory at his appearing.

He's wanting to do something great with your life. And I tell you friends, if you want your life to be used by God, there are battles that are real. You've got to be willing to face them and you can't do it on your own. Secondly, rely on God's power.

Peter relied on his own strength and failed. You must rely on the Lord. That's why I believe in praying and reading your Bible first thing in the morning. Why would I wait till the night when I could face a Prosmos at 10 a.m. in the morning?

Right? You ever say this, you know, when I read and pray in the morning, my day just seems to go so much. Oh, you say that too. But when I don't read and pray, I find myself more anxious, worried, frustrated easily.

Why? Because if I am not in the word and in prayer, how can I be walking in the Spirit while I've not spent time really making that time for the spiritual things? It's not wrong to read at night, should be done. Not everybody's a morning person, but Jesus should cause everybody to be a morning person. And whatever time you get up, he should be your first portion. And then thirdly, remember victory doesn't come by avoiding trials, but going through them. Sometimes people think, well, once I get through this, then, you know, I'm really going to serve Jesus. Or once I, they talk about being faithful once the trial's done.

That's a delusion. If you can't be faithful in the trial, you won't be faithful after the trial. The trial is testing your faithfulness. That's like the Israelites saying, well, once I get some water, then I'll serve God.

You're serving God by trusting him without water right now. So just know that it's an illusion to think you're going to fall into some utopian world, that there's no trials. You're and I are going to face it. And then lastly, remember God is with you. The temptation is not too great for God to get you through. God can bring us through whatever it is. And you will feel it. Sometimes you'll feel strong. Sometimes you'll feel stable. Sometimes you feel like you got patience like Job. Sometimes you feel like your faith is solid. Sometimes you just, but then other times worry seems to hit, things begin to compile on your life. And sometimes you don't even know why you're feeling like you're feeling. I think it's spiritual a lot of times. I think it's situational. I think it sometimes could be physical.

I think there's a lot that can come against a person. But the answer is resting on the Word of God, trusting in Christ, leaning in Him, spending time in prayer, diving into prayer, not just once. Jesus went away and prayed a second time, then He went away and prayed a third time.

And if that was His recourse, is there anything better that we could come up with than what Jesus did? And so tonight, temptations are going to come. They want to destroy you if Satan could have his way. Jesus will grow you if you lean on Him. So what are you going to do with the Prosmos that you're dealing with right now?

Tonight would be a good time to spend some time in prayer, wouldn't it? It's not the person. It's the test that's challenging what's really on the inside with you. It's not the situation that needs to change always. It's my heart that needs to change. I need to become more vertical and faith-filled.

Israel would say, well, as long as I could get to some water, get some food, then I'll be okay. No, it's not then. I need to be faithful now. So whatever you're going through tonight, lean into the Lord. Amen. Let's all stand this evening.