Temptations

             No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it. (I Corinthians 10:13)

 

            Some people go through terrible struggles and abuse as children and grow up to be normal people. Some grow up to be heroes. Some grow up to be victims and others grow up to be monsters. We tend to prefer to think that our struggles cause us to become heroes. If they can’t make us heroes, it’s better to be a victim. The jury is out on whether it’s better to end up “normal” or a serial killer. Of course, no one wants to be a serial killer, but at least if we become that, there’s some drama involved. If one becomes “normal,” how can we claim that our struggles were as great as we think they were? If we tell someone else of how difficult our life has been, and their response is either “You think that’s bad? You should have lived my life, now that was bad,” or a yawn, we’re disappointed or even hurt.

            The same is true with temptations. If the temptation to which I eventually give in is far bigger, harder, and sustained than everyone else’s, we’re almost heroic. If it is different from everyone else’s, at least there’s some drama involved. If the temptation is far less, we deserve pity for our weakness. But if it’s like everyone else’s, and the vast majority of people fail, too – if the failure is normal but some manage to overcome it, we’re failures not only because we’ve failed to defeat the temptation, but because we can make not claims to being special. We’re not special because we’re strong, or weak, or unusual. We’re boringly just like everyone else.

            And Paul assures us that God will provide the means of escape from the temptation, so claiming we were tempted beyond out ability to withstand doesn’t make us heroic. It involves us calling Paul and God liars.

            On the other side of this uncomfortable situation is God’s comfort. He has promised that He will provide the means of enduring the temptation. Jesus went so far as to say that He is the way. Our problem is that we don’t seek a way to endure the temptation. We might glance around quickly for a way to escape from it, but we spend a lot more time obsessing about the temptation, thinking about how weak we are and how strong it is, and about how much we want to give in and how angry we are with God because He doesn’t either give it to us or remove the temptation. Most of our temptations wouldn’t be hard to overcome if we didn’t pull them out, pet them, kiss them, take selfies with them, etc.