Focus: James 1:2-4 - KJV
2. My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; 3. Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. 4. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.
1 Peter 1:3-9
Temptations are tools in the hands of the devil aimed at kingdom candidates with a view to bringing them down from the exalted position they occupy on the hills of the Lord. Therefore, if anyone yields to temptation, he is said to have fallen into it. On the flip side, the Lord allows temptations just so as to promote the candidate climbing the Lord’s hill, from an initial level to a higher one, getting nearer to the height where he stands firmly in the light of the Lord at the hilltop. No wonder, after boasting about Job to the devil, God allowed the devil to tempt and try him even as He boasted that there was none as faithful as Job, in his time. Even our Lord Jesus Christ, who Himself came from the very heights of the hill of the Lord, was subjected to temptations: first before starting His earthly ministry and all through the rest of His life just so that the devil may add to Him burdens that will make Him unqualified to return to the hilltop. Thank God that Jesus confessed it Himself that there was nothing of the devil in Him.
If Christ faced diverse temptations, since we are not greater than Him, what is expected of us, just like He showed us by His example, is to look at the temptations as God’s way of getting us higher and nearer to Himself and therefore, count it all joy, even as we ensure we have the right foothold so as not to fall on account of temptation(s). For clarity, temptations try our faith in God; if indeed we do know our God, when temptations come like it confronted Job, we will stand firm in the promise of God and not the lie the enemy is trying to push by the temptation. So, we will wait patiently for our God to come through for us. Such patience is our way of climbing on without wavering, which in the end takes us to the height that we ordinarily desire. If anyone becomes impatient and yields to the pressure in temptation to lose faith in God, the devil gains height over such a person. Now, if we do understand the position occupied by the enemy, we will realize that he is below the wrung of the ladder. There is absolutely nowhere lower than that other than to get dipped in fire.
Beloved, that situation you are facing is not evidence of your being abandoned by the Lord. Rather, it is the Lord’s way of getting you closer unto Himself if you will not because of momentary pain lose faith in the one who has always loved and kept you afloat, above all harms and discomfort. If you are to be the best of whom the Lord has made you to be, then you will patiently keep faith in the Lord and allow the period of temptation to wane without yielding to the enemy. That situation shall soon come to pass. It cannot be endless since it has a beginning. Submit unto the Lord and not to that which the enemy seeks to achieve. Please do not fall. Be aware that until you get to the very top, temptations will constantly show up as it is a way of proving you have attained mastery of the current level you occupy. If you show no mastery, there will be need to repeat the class and that means elongated temptation. Pass once and move up higher.
SOLUTION: Submit fully unto the Lord and firmly resist the devil and he will flee from you. Doing this brings the period of temptation to an end faster.
Please pray: Father, please help me not to be led into any temptation that will cause me to fall from the heights in Jesus’ name. Take me to your very presence where I can never fall again by the reason of all I have endured in temptations in the hands of the enemy, in Jesus’ name.
If you are blessed by this post, kindly share with your contacts, as well as others, that they may be blessed also. Thank you and may God bless you abundantly as you do so, in Jesus’ name.