Daily Devotional For Wednesday, July 31, 2024

Today is Wonderful Wednesday and I pray your day goes well in the Lord. I would like to jump start us this morning with this joke:

“There was a man who was overweight and he decided that he had some excess pounds to lose. He was very diligent and stuck to his diet very strictly. He even had a new route to work so that he wouldn't drive by his favorite bakery in the morning. However, one day, he came into work with a big coffee cake. His coworkers started to scorn him and he said that he could explain. He said "you see I "accidentally" drove past my favorite bakery today and I saw all these delicious coffee cakes out on the display case. So I prayed. I prayed to God and said, 'if you really think I should have this delicious coffee cake, have an open parking spot right in front of the bakery.' And soon enough there was one on my 8th time around!” (Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/4wlcxo/my_pastor_told_me_this_joke_today_about_temptation/).

Temptation — we all have to deal with it. God tells us this in 1 Corinthians 10:13, “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” (NLT). The Greek New Testament word Paul uses for “temptation” is [πειρασμός, peirasmos]. This word was used in two ways. First, it refers to tests that challenge the integrity of one’s faith (as in 1 Pet. 1:6). But second,  it can also refer to “temptations,” things that appeal to our sinful tendencies and challenge our moral integrity (Luke 4:13). In the context of 1 Corinthians 10:13, Paul seems to have in mind the everyday snares of sin, but he could also have in mind various trials of faith that come with everyday life.

Pastor and author Chuck Swindoll gives us the context for Paul’s words:

“In any case, he says that up to this point they only had to deal with temptations “common to man.” Because Paul is about to discuss the spiritual, demonic dimension of idolatry, he may be referring to the opportunity they have at this moment to turn away from their current, mundane course of spiritual decline before they find themselves in a “supernatural” situation from which it would be much harder to escape, though it would never be too late to turn around and begin to do the right thing (10:13).”

The Corinthians desperately needed this encouragement, for they had chosen to live on the unraveling fringe of the Christian experience. Living dangerously close to the pagan world, they surrounded themselves with all its temptations. Paul warned that if they kept going in the same direction, what had begun as a celebration of liberty would end as a lamentation of bondage to sin, complete with demonic oppression. The express content of this warning is: “Flee from idolatry” (10:14) — (Source: Charles R. Swindoll, Swindoll’s Living Insights New Testament Commentary, “1 & 2 Corinthians,” p. 149).

Any time we surrender to temptation we have committed idolatry and in some cases demonology. This is why he writes what he does previously in 1 Corinthians 13:7-10, 20-21:

“Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.” (8) We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. (9) We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents, (10) nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer . . . (20) I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons. (21) You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons.” (ESV).

One of the sins the Corinthian church was guilty of was trying or putting Christ to the test (vs. 9). They thought they could live carelessly around corruption without being corrupted. The freedom we have in Christ is not to be used to see how close we can come to unrighteousness while at the same time attempting to serve Christ through righteousness. Pastor and author John MacArthur writes this:

“Many Christians fall into moral problems simply because they are overconfident in themselves. They enter into and continue relationships that may not be wrong in themselves but which offer strong temptations. And when temptations come they think they can handle it, often finding out too late that they could not. Or they go places and do things that are closely associated with immorality, stopping short of doing anything immoral themselves. But even if a person never commits an immoral act in such situations, his mind is filled with vulgar ideas and images, and his spiritual life and testimony are seriously weakened” (Source: John MacArthur, The MacArthur New Testament Commentary, “1 Corinthians,” p. 224).

Some Christians use their freedom to push or test Christ to the limit. They try to see how much they can get out of Christ and how much they can get by Him. If you want to see a biblical example of how this could end for you or me, simply look at Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5. It did not go well for them. This is why we are warned repeatedly in Scripture of the danger of mocking God (Gal. 6:7). Some Christians push the limits of their freedom in Christ to see how much of the flesh they can enjoy and how much of the world they can enjoy while claiming the “joy of the Lord is their strength (Neh. 8:10). 

Sometimes it is our over-confidence that brings about our fall. We feel that since we live in the “age of grace,” God’s grace covers a “multiples of sins.” But the Apostle Paul refutes such thinking in Romans 6:1-2, “Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of His wonderful grace? (2) Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it?” (NLT).

The danger of being self-confident is that you become less dependent on God’s Word and God’s Holy Spirit and we become more careless in our living. Therefore, the more careless we become in our lives, the more vulnerable to temptation we become and the less resistance to sin we have. As in the joke above, we must make sure we do not make 8 trips around using Your name as a means to get a “cake” so that we can eat it too.

Questions To Consider

1. When it comes to the world, where do you draw the line?
2. The next question I ask comes from a youth musical my youth group sang in the late 1970s called Good News. The lyrics go this way: “I’ve got some friends who are Christians and they go to church every Sunday. But boy, you ought to see them on Monday! Chorus: Sunday’s Child, don’t be a Sunday’s Child. On Sunday he is quite a Saint. On Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, Saturday a Saint, he ain’t!” Would you say you are just a “Sunday’s child?”
3. To think we can watch media that dishonors God and that it will have no effect on us is either naive or ignorant. For you, what is the most difficult or challenging part of keeping the line clearly drawn between our culture and Christ?

Scripture To Meditate On: James 4:4,: Don’t you realize that friendship with the world makes you an enemy of God? I say it again: If you want to be a friend of the world, you make yourself an enemy of God” (NLT).

Prayer To Pray: “Dear Jesus, I do not want to be a conformist to the culture, but a transformer for Christ. Please forgive me when I prefer the acceptance and praise of people more than You. As I live in this age of grace, please help me not to take advantage of Your grace by toying with sin, idolatry and demonology. You have promised me that You have given me the power to overcome any and all temptation, but sometimes, I have to make sure I am not setting myself up to test my own vulnerabilities. Jesus, thank You for Your grace, power and promises. I love You Jesus. In Jesus’ name, Amen!”

I love you Southside!—Pastor Kelly