Quote of the Day

Speaking on James 1:14: 

Temptation finds its strength and source from within ourselves. The brutal truth of our sin, personal sinning, is that it is all in and of ourselves - not only can't God be blamed, but no other (person or thing) can be blamed - it is sad to realize how many still trust the validity of their 'blame shifting' and then add an extra 'perimeter fence' of protection by no longer identifying sin as sin - sinners are encouraged by other sinners to find shelter in their being a victim. 

The process is ls illustrated by James as being , first, each person being tempted (tested to prove slavery to sin) by their own desire/lust (ἐπιθυμίας - passions, inner cravings and inclinations) - this process of temptation first "lures" (NASB has "carried away") - "lure" is a better descriptive word since it was used of luring a fish with bait and visuals. 

Then they are "enticed" (another hunting/fishing term) and so are trapped and ensnared - there is an attraction, leading to exploration, ending in entrapment (hooked) - these lusts then become the trap itself (prison, unhookable hook).

 

This can be pictured as if there are internal counselors working to achieve an inner desire - the counselor of feelings begins to prod us for attention for some "needed relief" or fulfillment, followed closely by the advisor of reason (not considering that feelings has paid-off/bribed or blackmailed reason by its relentlessness and insistence) - the advisor of reason is then accompanied by the scholar of memory, vividly portraying past yielding, only showing photos of the "good times" - with all such counsel, we play along (disregarding the Holy Spirit) and so the manager of decision, believing all needed research has been dutifully done, signs-off to action (sin). 

So rather than being a victim of the external influences to sin, we discover we are instigators, working with even the enemies from without to conquer any convicting and motivating work of God within us - the "conspiracy" ends up being us.

- Don Lambert

From his sermon series on James

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Freedom from sin is only granted to Christians.  Paul's statement in 1 Corinthians 10:13 tells  believers that they have not been seized by any temptation that cannot be overcome.  He is not talking to non-Christians, who Paul establishes elsewhere are controlled by the sinful flesh and cannot do anything spiritually pleasing to God (Rom. 8:7-8)...."...walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh..."(Gal 5:16-17).  Again, this command is to Christians.  Unbelievers cannot "walk by the Spirit."  However, believers walking by the Spirit have the ability  to "not gratify the desires of the flesh ."  If this is true, that no temptation has ever come across a Christian that is not common to all, and that sin is nothing more than a Christian yielding to his fleshly desires, then how can addiction as commonly understood (i.e., uncontrollable urges and impulses) actually exist for believers?
......Granted, sin can certainly feel irresistible, but perhaps it feels that way because we capitulate to it far too readily.  We have not built up the essential perseverance to repel it.  We have repeatedly said yes, and like muscles that have atrophied from disuse, our spirit has become weak because we have not exercised the fortitude to resist temptation as we ought.

- Victor Kuligin

Quote from his book:

The Language of Salvation:  Discovering the Riches of What it Means to Be Saved

Quote of the Day

When you look around and see the devil's vast empire and what a little spot of ground contains Christ's subjects - what heaps of precious souls lie prostrate under Satan's feet and what a tiny regiment of saints arch under Christ's banner of grace - perhaps you ask yourself, "is hell stronger than heaven?  Are the arms of Satan more victorious than the cross of Christ?"  But if you consider what I am about to tell you, you will wonder that Christ has any to follow Him rather than that He has so few. 

Every son of man is born in sin (51:5).  So when the prince of this world first approaches a young soul with this or that wicked proposal, he finds the soul unarmed and in its natural state already familiar with his policies.  Yielding to Satan's control will therefore not cause much of a stir in the naturally sinful heart.  But when Christ campaigns for a soul, He proposes sweeping changes.  And the selfish soul, which generally likes things as they are, answers Him with the same scorn as the rebellious citizens in the parable:  "We will not have this man to reign over us!" (Luke 19:14).  The vote is unanimous:  All the lusts cast their ballots against Christ, and rise up like the Philistines against Samson, whom they called the destroyer of their country (Judges 16:23-24).  If God's grace did not step in and override the veto, the whole world would be held in Satan's sway. 

Satan's conquests are limited to itnorant, graceless souls who have neither strength nor strength to oppose him.  They are born imprisoned to sin; all he has to do is keep them there. But when he assaults a saint, whose freedom was won at the Cross, once for all, then he is laying siege to a city with gates and bars.  Sooner or later, he must retreat in shame, unable to pluck the weakest saint out of the Savior's hand.  Doubt your own strength, but never doubt Christs's.  In your gravest conflicts with Satan, trust Him to bring you out of the devil's dominion.

- William Gurnall (Daily Readings from: The Christian in Complete Armour)

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 You should find great strength and encouragement in the knowledge that your commission is divine.  God Himself underwrites your battle and has appointed His own Son "the captain of [your] salvation" (Hebrews 2:10).  He will lead you on to the field with courage, and bring you off with honor.......For bravery none compares with our Lord.  He never turned  His head from danger, not even when hell's hatred and heaven's justice appeared against Him.  Knowing all that was about to happen, Jesus went forth and said, "Whom seek ye?" (John 18:4).  Satan could not overcome Him - our Savior never lost a battle, not even when he lost His life.  He won the victory, carrying His spoils to heaven in the triumphant chariot of His ascension.  There He makes an open show of them, to the unspeakable joy of saints and angels.    As part of Christ's army, you march in the ranks of gallant spirits.  Every one of your fellow soldiers is a child of a King.  Some, like you, are in the midst of battle, besieged on every side by affliction and temptation.  Others, after many assaults, repulses and rallyings of their faith, are already standing upon the wall as conquerors.  From there they look down and urge you, their comrades on earth, to march up the hill after them.  This is their cry: "Fight to the death , and the City is your own, as now it is ours! For the waging of a few days' conflict, you will be rewarded with Heaven's glory.  One moment of this celestial joy will dry up all your tears, heal all your wounds, and erase the sharpness of the fight with all the joy of your permanent victory."

- William Gurnall
from Daily Readings from The Christian In Complete Armour (William Gurnall)

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A mighty bulwark is our God

A doughty ward and weapon.

He helps us clear from every rod

By which we now are smitten.

Still our ancient foe

Girds him to strike a blow.

Might and guile his gear,

His armor striketh fear

 On earth is not his equal.

By our own strength is nothing won.

We court at once disaster.

There fights for us the Champion

 Whom God has named our Master.

Would you know his name?

Jesus Christ the same

Lord Sabaoth is he.

No other God can be.

The field is his to hold it.

And though the fiends on every hand

Were threatening to devour us,

We would not waver from our stand.

They cannot overpower us.

This world’s prince may rave.

However he behave,

He can do no ill.

God’s truth abideth still.

One little word shall fell him.

That word they never can dismay,

 However much they batter,

For God himself is in the fray

And nothing else can matter.

Then let them take our life,

Goods, honor, children, wife.

We will let all go.

They shall not conquer so,

 For God will win the battle

 

Martin Luther

Quote of the Day

There before you is the grisly old enemy to spiritual progress standing astride the path of obedience to Christ – SELF!  This monster cries out daily to be served.  He challenges the dominion of Jesus Christ and opposes every devotion of time, energy and love to the Lord.  But it is a strange war that we may win only by feeling ourselves the painful blows we give.  Every denial of self is felt keenly.  How we would love to change the scene of combat!  But on every occasion when we are serious about advancing in righteousness, we must contend with self.

Walter Chantry

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Satan labours what he can to provoke the Christian to heart sins - to stir up and forment these inward motions of sin in the Christians bosom. Hence it is, he can go about no duty, but these - his imps, I may call them - haunt him; one motion or other darts in to interrupt him, as Paul tells us of himself, 'When he would do good, evil was present with him.' If a Christian should turn back whenever these cross the way of him, he should never go on his journey to heaven. It is the chief game the devil hath left to play against the children of God - now his field-army is broken, and his commanding power taken away which he had over them - to come out of these his holds where he lies skulking, and fall upon the rear with these suggestions. He knows his credit now is not so great with the soul as when it was his slave. Then no drudgery work was so base that it would not do at his command; but now the soul is out of his bondage, and he must not think to command another's servant as his own. No, all he can do is to watch the fittest season - when the Christian least suspects - and then to present some sinful motion, handsomely dressed up, to the eye of the soul, that the Christian may, before he is aware, take this brat up and dandle it in his thoughts, till at last he makes it his own by embracing it; and this he knows will defile the soul; and, may be, this boy sent in at the window, may open the door to let in a greater thief. Or if he should not so prevail, yet the guilt of these heart sins, yea, their very neighborhood will be a sad vexation to a gracious heart, whose nature is so pure that it abhors all filthiness - so that to be haunted with such notions, is as if a living man should be chained to a stinking carcass, that wherever he goes he must draw that after him; and whose love is so dear to Christ, that it cannot bear the company of those thoughts without amazement and horror, which are so contrary and abusive to his beloved. This makes Satan so desirous to be ever raking in the unregenerate part, that as a dunghill stirred, it may offend them both with the noisome streams which arise from it.

William Gurnall

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While God most often appeals to our wills through our reason, sin and Satan usually appeal to us through our desires.

Jerry Bridges

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A Christian knows that death shall be the funeral of all his sins, his sorrows, his afflictions, his temptations, his vexations, his oppressions, his persecutions. He knows that death shall be the resurrection of all his hopes, his joys, his delights, his comforts, his contentments.

Thomas Brooks

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The spirit knows the right way, an desires to follow it, but the flesh lacks courage and finds it too hard, too hazardous and wearisome, and so it stifles the voice of the spirit.  The spirit assents when Jesus bids us love our enemies, but flesh and blood are too strong and prevent our carrying it out.  Therefore we have to practice strictest daily discipline only so can the flesh learn the painful lesson that it has no rights of its own…The flesh resists this daily humiliation, first by a frontal attack, and later by hiding itself under the words of the spirit (i.e. in the name of "evangelical liberty").  We claim liberty from all legal compulsion, from  self- martyrdom and mortification, and play this off against the proper evangelical use of discipline and asceticism……Any objection that asceticism is wrong, and that all we need is faith , is quite beside the point; it is cruel to suggest such a thing, and it is no help to us at all.  When all is said and done, the life of faith is nothing if not an unending struggle of the spirit with every available weapon against the flesh.

 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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I was somewhat encouraged by reading in my father's memoir, and in reflecting that he passed through far greater spiritual conflicts than will probably ever be mine….I see now that it is not always best for us to have the light of God's countenance.  Do not spend your time and strength in asking for me that blessing, but this -- that I may be transformed into the image of Christ in His own time, in His own way.

 

Elizabeth Prentiss