The Source of Temptation

You are fighting sexual temptation, and a married person makes advances toward you. You are fighting an attraction to alcohol, and your company requires you to attend a conference where the liquor will be flowing freely. You are fighting an attraction to pornography, and you discover that the hotel at which your company's conference is held has pornographic films available in your room. You are struggling with your temper, and you are cut off in traffic by a big black limousine---with tinted windows, and government tags, and a bumper sticker that reads: 'I'm spending your children's inheritance.' Are these TRIALS, or TEMPTATIONS? James says, in effect, THEY ARE NOT TEMPTATIONS UNLESS WE MAKE THEM TEMPTATIONS, and we make them temptations by succumbing to the sinful proclivities, the sinful tendencies of our own hearts. 'Let no one say, when he is tempted, I am tempted by God.' Each of the situations we mentioned could be a POSITIVE FORCE IN YOUR LIFE, DEPENDING ON HOW YOU RESPOND TO IT. It could actually assist in your sanctification. These experiences come to us merely as trials. They are morally neutral. It is how we respond to the trial that determines if that trial becomes a temptation.