“The temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you are tempted, he will show you a way out so that you can endure.”
1 Corinthians 10:13 NLT
For me, the biggest temptation of all is to consider abandoning faith and hope in God altogether. This temptation has on occasion become pressing. All I can see are my own disappointments; spaces within which I anticipated God’s intervention yet felt I was abandoned and left to cope alone.
In my early days as a Christian, these spaces were usually about my own personal aspirations and desires. My motives were far from pure as I asked God to deliver to me resources or results that I felt I needed. I lived quite the consumerist Christian path. God was my sugar daddy rather more than my heavenly Father.
As I matured, my battles appeared at the critical pinch points I did not want to endure. Then, through the challenges of caring, I despaired of God’s ability and threw the gift of grace back in God’s face on more than one occasion.
God just kept on loving me through it all. I slowly connected with the fact that faith was not reason, but a choice to invest in God’s promise. I was, in fact, being tested and invited to consider the level of my commitment to God and his word. Only as I grew savvy in the ways of discipleship did I develop an ability to wait on God for his way out.
Even as I write and broadcast words of encouragement born of experience, I wrestle with my own doubts. I hear and hold to God’s promise that I will never be tempted beyond my capacity to endure, yet that is, more often than not, cold comfort in the heat of temptation itself. I am a mixture of awe and wonder in God, blended with fears and anxieties over my welfare. Is God sufficient for tomorrow and all my future tomorrows?
QUESTION
In all honesty, where are the battle lines for you in your walk of faith?
PRAYER
Lord God, thank you for your faithfulness, your protection and your guidance to lead me through this life.
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