HOW JESUS OVERCAME TEMPTATION

When Jesus was on His 40-day fast satan came to tempt him. Jesus used 2 simple techniques to overcome the temptation. The first was to fight the temptation with the Word of God. The 2nd was a forceful determination to obey the Bible and the Father.

In this thread, I will add one verse every day which we can use to fight back.

1 Corinthians 6:18 - "Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body."

This verse is written first for physical immorality, but it still has many things we can learn for P.

Techniques for fleeing sexual immorality: Have a list of 5 things you should be thinking about. Then every time you slip back into lust thought patterns pray: “Father, help me to flee these immoral thoughts.” Then refocus on what you should be thinking about.

Be aggressive about going to war at your times of greatest temptation. Always have a complete plan for what you “will do,” at those times.

When tempted be assertive! When Jesus was tempted in the wilderness, the devil showed Him all the kingdoms of the world. “All this I will give to you,” he said, “But you must bow down and worship me.” By this time, Jesus had had enough. “Get away from me, Satan!” he said, “For it is written: “Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.”

Did you catch that exclamation mark? Jesus didn’t politely ask him to leave. On the contrary, Jesus demanded the Devil to get lost.

Action Point: When you have had enough temptation say, “Get away from me, Satan! For it is written: “Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.”

More tomorrow.

 

Ephesians 6 says: “12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”
So this is our opponent. We have 2 weapons for them, the Word, and prayer. Let's look at Psalm 119 which says "Turn my eyes away from worthless things; preserve my life according to your word." Now we can attack our opponent with a prayer based on this verse. Pray: “Father, take away this spirit of lust and turn my eyes away from worthless things.”

We can also add power to this prayer by working incessantly to turn our eyes from worthless things. We can add even more power by going to war with all sin. Because sin gives satan a foothold in our lives. When he has a foothold he will attack you often and with power. Go to war and get him out completely and your temptation will drop a lot.

During His temptation Jesus said: “It is written, “‘You shall worship the Lord your God,
and Him only shall you serve.’”

In conclusion: We stay clean by worshiping the Lord and by serving the Lord.

 

Jesus fasted from food for 40 days. The Bible is clear that fasting gives us power to fight temptation. In another thread Tao Jones said, "I left the internet and "smart" devices behind for a period of nearly two years while I worked on getting free." His fast seems to have really changed his life. If he reads this, I am curious how his joy level is now?
We can fast from food, computers, risky TV shows or movies.
Tonight I will try to watch the Buc's football game. That is one way of fasting from more risky programs.
The more we deny ourselves, the more power over P we will have.

 

A decent percentage of our joy depends on what we look at. Satan knows this and he will attack with his temptations for short-term fun. How do we react to his attack? We copy what Jesus did, that's how. Jesus' response to satans attack was to say, “Get thee behind me satan.” We can say that, and we can say, “You want my life filled with destruction for the week and the month. I am not buying what you are selling this time.”

Then, while we watch TV, satan will present his temptation and tell you to think, “I want this more than anything.” But instead, we quote to him:

Matthew 6:22 The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.

23 But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!” And you immediately run from the sin.

Then you are out and about on a hot summer day. Satan tells you how spectacular that woman is (who is not wearing close to enough clothing). But, following Jesus' example we quote to him:

Colossians 3:5 ESV Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.”

Put to death. Ouch. I need to do that. Idolatry... lust... I hope not.

Websters say idolatry is an immoderate attachment or devotion to something. Noooooooo.

I don't think looking is a good idea anymore.


That's how it works. The more verses we quote, the more we come to our senses.