Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2603
“There hats no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it” 1 Corinthians 10:13.
THE children of God are all subject to temptation—some of them are tempted more than others, but I an persuaded that there is not one, except those who are too young to be conscious of evil, who will enter Heaven without having endured some temptation. If anyone could have escaped, surely it would have been “the First-Born among many brethren,” but you will remember how He was led of the Spirit, straight from the waters of His Baptism, into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And the Apostle Paul informs us that He “was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.” Truly, the Lord Jesus might say to us who are His followers, “If I, your Master and Lord, have been tempted, you must not expect to escape temptation, for the disciple is not above his Master, nor the servant above his Lord.”
The fact that we are tempted ought to humble us, for it is sad evidence that there is sin still remaining in us. I am old enough to remember the times when we used to strike with a flint upon the steel in order to get a light in the morning, and I recollect that I always left off trying to produce a spark when I found that there was no tinder in the box. I believe that the devil is no fool and that if there is a man who has no tinder in the box—that is, no corruption in his nature— depend upon it, Satan will not long continue to tempt him! He does not waste his time in such a useless exercise. The man who believes that he is perfect can never pray the Lord’s Prayer—he must offer one of his own making, for he will never be willing to say, “Lead us not into temptation.” But, Beloved, because the devil thinks it worth his while to tempt us, we may conclude that there is something in us that is temptable—that sin still dwells there, notwithstanding that the Grace of God has renewed our hearts.
The fact that we are tempted ought also to remind us of our weakness. I referred just now to the model prayer of our Lord Jesus Christ, which contains the sentence, “Lead us not into temptation.” The reason for presenting that petition must be because we are so weak and frail. We ask that we may not be burdened, for our back is not strong, and we plead that we may not have sin put before us in any of its enticing forms, for, oftentimes, the flesh borrows strength from the world and even from the devil! And these allied powers will be too much for us unless the Omnipotence of God shall be exerted on our behalf to hold us up lest we fall.
Some children of God, whom I know of, are very greatly troubled because they are tempted. They think they could bear trial if it were trial dissociated from sin, though I do not see how we can, as a general rule, separate trial from temptation, for every trial that comes to us has in it some kind of temptation or other, either to unbelief, or to murmuring, or to the use of wrong means to escape from the trial. We are tempted by our mercies and we are tempted by our miseries— that is, tempted in the sense of being tried by them—but, to the child of God, the most grievous thing is that, sometimes, he is tempted to do or say things which he utterly hates. He has set before him, in a pleasant aspect, sins which are perfectly abhorrent to him. He cannot bear the very name of them! Yet Satan comes and holds before the child of God the unclean meats which he will never touch. And I have known the devil to tempt the people of God by injecting into their mind blasphemous thoughts, hurling them into their ears as with a hurricane. Yes, even when you are in prayer it may happen to you that thoughts the very opposite of devotional, will come flocking into your brain. A little noise in the street will draw you off from communion with God and, almost before you are aware of it, your thoughts, like wild horses, will have gone galloping over hill and dale—and you hardly know how you shall ever catch them.
Now, such temptations as these are dreadfully painful to a child of God. He cannot bear the poisoned breath of sin and when he finds that sin stands knocking at his door, shouting under his window, pestering him day and night, as it has occurred with some—I hope not with many—then he is sorely beset and is grievously troubled. It may help such a person if I remind him that there is no sin in being tempted. The sin is that of the tempter, not of the tempted. If you resist the temptation, there is something praiseworthy about your action. There is nothing praiseworthy about the temptation—that is evil and only evil, but you did not tempt yourself—he or she that tempted you must bear the blame of the temptation. You are evidently not blameworthy for thoughts that grieve you—they may prove that there is sin still remaining in you, but there is no sin in your being tempted. The sin is in your yieldingto the temptation, but blessed shall you be if you can stand up against it. If you can overcome it, if your spirit does not yield to it, you shall even be blessed through it! “Blessed is the man that endures temptation.” There is a blessedness even in the temptation and though for the present it seems not to be joyous, but grievous, nevertheless, afterward, it yields blessed fruit to those who are exercised thereby.