This time it was Dan’s turn to go along with Daddy shopping. We got our groceries and were walking to the car when we passed the hardware and paint store and I remembered I needed extra paint and a brush. So I turned in, got my paint and brush, and said, “Dan, here, you carry this, please.” And he wasn’t there? He was so busy watching people he didn’t notice me turn in, so he chugged along half a block or so and then noticed I wasn’t there. So he did what we had told them, “If you ever get lost, ask a police officer for help.” He saw one coming and stopped him and told him, “My Daddy lost me”.
Well, the Police station and City hall was just around the corner, so the officer took him there. When he brought Dan in the City clerk, who was a church member, said “Why, that’s my Pastor's boy. "What are you doing here, young man?” Dan said, “My Daddy lost me.” So the clerk reached for the phone to call our house, but then decided to wait a bit. They felt maybe I would show up. I soon walked through the door. There sat my son on the front desk, grinning and eating an ice cream cone. He enjoyed the whole experience so much that every time he went shopping with Daddy I had a hard time to keep him from ‘getting lost’, because he figured each time he would get ice cream!
This little bit of family history shows just how temptation works. The bait was that ice cream cone that a well-meaning clerk gave him. The intention was excellent, and it did what it was meant to do, keep him occupied until I got there. But the result was that he had a desire for this, and the way to get it was to get ‘lost’. Which was a wrong action on his part.
St. James writes about faith. It will be tried, he writes (1,3), but he also reminds them that “Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed, then, when lust has conceived, it brings forth sin, and sin, when it is finished, brings forth death”.
1,14.15.
The result of temptation which is not resisted always is tragic. And there are always consequences, "it bringeth forth death", writes James. Satan blurs our vision of these consequences; we take them lightly; the short pleasure has a high cost unto ourselves, to our loved ones, and to our relation to our Lord. It tends to make us avoid Him.
The answer is, “RESIST HIM”. Have nothing to do with advances of Satan. Peter writes, “Be self controlled and alert” 1 Peter 5,8-9. Solomon’s wise word is “My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not.” Proverbs. 1,10.
The Lord warns us, and arms us. So “Put on the whole armor of God so that you can take your stand against the wiles of the devil . . .take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God”. Eph. 6,11.17.
Rich Shuman said, “The biggest threat to our well being is absence of moral clarity and purpose”. God has given you this in his Word, the Sword of the Spirit. Be sure to arm yourself by your daily reading of God’s Word.
GPD 5/3/10
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