Greetings!
“By his own evil desire.” The Greek word translated here as “evil desire” really means strong or intense desire. It does not have a specific meaning of good or bad. In fact, it is the same word Jesus used in Luke 22:15 when He said to His disciples: “I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.”
Change the word evil to strong. This strong or intense desire, at its foundation, is built into you by the Creator. He has created you with a deep need for love and acceptance so that you will seek and find love and acceptance in Him. This need is the foundation of every desire. However, our God-created desires become misdirected when we seek to have them met outside of God. Anything outside of God only meets the surface of the need and provides only temporary relief and must be repeated over and over again. “As when a hungry man dreams that he is eating, but he awakens, and his hunger remains; as when a thirsty man dreams that he is drinking, but he awakens faint, with his thirst unquenched” (Isaiah 29:8). We spend our resources on bread, which does not satisfy. We devour, but are still hungry; we eat, but are not filled.
When we repeatedly turn our strong and intense desire outward to the world, a pattern of behavior becomes fixed. The very need or desire that should have turned us to God has turned us away from Him. Instead of being freed from our need by having it eternally met, we become enslaved to our need by having it forever unsatisfied. We have, then, a misdirected desire. It has taken root in us. It becomes a root of unrighteousness and it grows a fruit called sin.
This misdirected desire, this root, has developed a magnetic attraction to something in the world. We’ll call the object or situation in the world a “stimulus.” A stimulus in the world acts as a magnet to entice you and drag you away. James is really using a fishing term here. It means “to bait” or “to set a trap.” Satan has dangled bait in front of you. Your misdirected desire has taken the bait and been lured into a trap. Flesh has promised what it can’t deliver.
The stimulus has no power of its own. What tempts one person does not tempt another. The power is not in the object or the occurrence in the world. The stimulus is neutral. Unless it is enticing, it cannot tempt. Its only power is the attraction it holds for you. It is your own misdirected desire dragging you away.
“After desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin” (James 1:15). The root of unrighteousness in your personality or soul, mates with the stimulus in the world. The mating results in conception, and sin is born. Sin is born of the mating between your misdirected desire and a stimulus in the world. If one or the other (misdirected desire or stimulus in the world) did not exist, no mating could occur. It is unrealistic to think that the stimuli the world offers will disappear. Jesus said that we would have trouble in the world.
He prayed that we not be removed from the world, but protected from its damaging influence. The stimuli in the world will not go away. Where does the answer lie? The root of unrighteousness must be destroyed. Once the root is gone, the stimulus in the world has nothing to mate with. The stimulus loses its power and becomes a neutral object. Once the inside is clean, the outside will be clean also.
Temptation That Leads to Purity Temptation can lead to sin, or temptation can lead to purity. Temptation forces choice. Every time we face temptation, we choose where to take our needs. Will we allow God to fulfill them and satisfy our eternal cravings?
Or will we take the drive-through fast-food approach? Will we think longterm or quick fix? Will we choose God or will we choose Baal? Every temptation forces us deeper into the heart of the Father or anchors us more securely in the world. It’s time to choose to altar ourselves.
In the same way that our fleshly impulses became flesh patterns by repeating an action over and over again, so temptation can cause us to become fixed in the way of the Spirit by persistent choice. We can choose Him over and over until He becomes our holy habit and the ways of the Spirit become our spontaneous choice.
Temptation shows us the places at which we are still responsive to sin. Temptation is a heart echogram. It pinpoints the weak places. It exposes flesh. Remember that the stimulus can only entice if a root of
unrighteousness is present. Temptation exposes impurities. It unmasks our hearts so that sin cannot lurk there undetected. It exposes flesh and forces a crucifixion moment. Temptation forces flesh into the light where it can be destroyed.
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Jennifer Kennedy Dean 2019© | Legacy Writings