The Cause Of Temptation

AN INTERNAL SOURCE

James said that temptation begins when we are “drawn away by [our] own desires” (v. 14). However, not all desires are bad. The desire to eat and drink is good when kept within God’s guidelines. The desire for rest and sleep is good within limits. And, within God’s stated boundaries, the desire for sex is a good thing. The problem comes when we want to satisfy our desires outside of God’s will. For example, eating is enjoyable, but gluttony is a sin. Sleep is essential, but slothfulness is a sin. Sexual relationships within the marriage covenant are healthy, but adultery is a sin. Many of our desires are not evil in and of themselves. But some of them are, and that means trouble.

When our “own desires” (the internal source of temptation) attach themselves to an evil object, we are “drawn away” from our place of security. James painted a picture of us living in a secure place, only to allow a desire contrary to God’s will to draw us away from that place of security into the open where we become vulnerable to sin.

Such temptation to sin is a very personal matter—what tempts one person may not tempt the next person at all. Hence the words James carefully crafted: “each one” is drawn away. No one is immune to sinful desires, and each of us is responsible for our “own desires.” We cannot blame God, the Devil, or circumstances. If there were no evil desire in our heart, there would be no temptation to sin. Yet this internal source seeks to draw us away and causes us to want to play outside of God’s boundaries.

AN EXTERNAL FORCE

The internal source of temptation is selfish desire, the external force is deception; and when these two coincide, the result is sinful behavior.

James indicated that once desire becomes self-centered, it causes us to be “enticed.” This word carries with it the connotation of being baited or deceived. The expression about being hooked on something finds its origin in this Greek word. And the mention of bait definitely calls for a fish story.

An eight-pound black bass I caught is the perfect illustration of both how temptation works and what happens when we don’t heed James’s warning. You see, I took a beautiful plastic worm, stuck a fishing hook through it, and bent the worm around the hook so it couldn’t be seen. I attached a transparent fishing line to the hook. Then I dropped the worm into the lake and jiggled it along the bottom. From its hole the big bass saw this delicious-looking worm. It had a desire (an internal source), so when the external force came along, the bass could not resist. The bass swallowed the worm, was dragged away from its safe hole, and put into the boat where it met its demise.

All of us have been hooked by the world’s allurements just as the bass was by my baited hook. Something, someone, some opportunity looked so attractive, so satisfying, so fulfilling. It was a complete deception, but we took the bait and got hooked. That fish would never have swum out of its hole to bite a bare hook. I had to hide it, disguise it, make it look attractive. Similarly, temptation appeals to our natural desires while deceptively hiding the fact that biting the worm, so to speak, will lead us to harm and destruction.

No one put the worm in the fish’s mouth. It came out of the hole because of its own desire and took the bait. Sin doesn’t start with the bait. Sin starts as a desire in our own hearts, and this has been true of human beings from the beginning. No one put the forbidden fruit in Eve’s mouth. She desired the fruit even though she knew it was forbidden. Then came the external force of the serpent’s word. She saw, she took, and the rest is history.

When we grab the bait, the hidden hook grabs us. Sin takes place when our selfish desire and Satan’s deception connect, and we are lured away from our safe place in God’s will. If it weren’t for the evil desires within the human heart, Satan would never gain a victory when he dangles his enticing hooks in front of us. Sin does begin in the heart (Mark 7:20–23). What a person needs is a new nature, a change from within, a change of desires.

It is not a sin to be tempted. We are all tempted. Jesus Himself was tempted. Sin results when the internal source (self-centered desire) and the negative external force (deception) come together and we take the bait. Another example. Two men are walking down the street. They pass an enticement, a hooker. She smiles. They both see the bait. Why does one man take it and the other walk on by on the other side of the street? The men’s responses are directly related to their internal desires. One has desires that abide within the parameter of God’s will because he knows the Word and follows the Spirit. The other man has desires that are outside God’s will because he has exposed himself to worldly or harmful influences.

On the evening before His crucifixion, while He agonized in prayer in Gethsemane’s garden, Jesus left us some good advice when He said to His disciples, “Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation” (Matthew 26:41). Prayer has to do with the internal source of temptation, our own desires. Prayer keeps us connected with God so that His desires are our desires. Watching has to do with the external force of temptation, the deception. We are to be alert, to watch out. The bait has a hook in it. If we look closely enough, we will see the enticement for what it is—a trap!