"Do not let my heart be drawn to what is evil so that I take part in wicked deeds along with those who are evildoers; do not let me eat of their delicacies."
Psalm 141:4
The Psalmist rightly speaks of temptations as "delicacies." Often, the very things we know not to do, draw us like magnets. Of temptation, Paul wrote in Romans 7:19, "For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do - this I keep on doing." The writers, Paul and David, both remind us of our own struggles with temptation. Oscar Wilde, nineteenth-century Irish playwright, once wrote of his own struggles, "I can resist everything but temptation." His struggle is our struggle. Our hope, however, comes in knowing that there is help beyond ourselves through the presence and power of the Holy Spirit.
The writer of Hebrews reminds us that we can overcome temptation because Christ has overcome. "For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are - yet he did not sin." (Hebrews 4:15) There will always be temptation...but let us remember that there is also always help to resist.
Prayer: Gracious God, give me strength to resist the "delicacies" of temptation in the name of Jesus, the Christ, Amen.
Jim Abernathy
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