August 2
“Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.” (James 4:7-8)
Yesterday we listed the 24 Overcoming Temptation principles (and keep in mind there could very well be more than these; see if you can find additional principles in your study of the scriptures) and asked how are we doing in these areas and which principles, if we were to make significant progress applying them, would make the greatest impact on our ability to overcome temptation and reduce the amount of sin in our lives.
Please study the list of principles and choose (a) one to three principles that you think you can implement quickly and easily (low hanging fruit so to speak, easy and quick to do), and (b) one to three principles that you think would have the greatest impact on your ability to overcome temptation if you were able to do them diligently (these may be easy or difficult to implement, but you know they would make a big impact on your life if you did them). Probably you should have no more than three or four total.
Now we will discuss a few thoughts about what I find to be one of the most important parts of all of this: diligence, “stick-to-it-iveness,” perseverance. The diligence and skills needed to keep doing these things day in and day out, to make them habits in our lives, this in my opinion will determine our victory or defeat. It is relatively easy to do these things for a short while, and we may even enjoy great freedom from sin and elation at our ability to say no to temptation. But that can be short-lived if we are not able to make permanent changes to our thinking and our habits that enable us to continue to resist temptation when things are very difficult and our human relationships sour, when circumstances make us think that even God has forgotten us or is against us.
Peter says, “…applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, in your perseverance, godliness, and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love.” (2 Peter 1:5-7)
The point is that we need diligence to apply ourselves to these qualities of godliness, they don’t just happen. Unfortunately, we usually can’t just pray once or twice and find that these things are permanently characteristic of us. They take focused concentration and hard work, day after day sticking to it, and practicing discipline in that area. They take diligence, the “precious possession.” (Proverbs 12:27) Do you have diligence? Do you feel you have what it takes to overcome and keep overcoming? Praise God if you do and are confident about it, but if you are like the majority of us and feel uneasy and unsure about our ability to overcome, read on for more tips that hopefully will help you in your struggle to diligently overcome temptation in the long run.